


-Raccoons only live once-

by Sinikettu



Category: Guardians of the Galaxy - All Media Types, Marvel (Comics), Marvel Cinematic Universe, rocket raccoon - Fandom
Genre: F/M, Rocket isn't going to win any prizes at parenting, Space zombies, high tech hero, low tech planet
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-02-19
Updated: 2018-04-20
Packaged: 2018-05-21 15:47:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 14
Words: 54,880
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6057222
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sinikettu/pseuds/Sinikettu
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An epic invasion breaks out across the far reaches of the galaxy, tearing a planet-sized hole across time and space. Caught in the crossfire and with no contact from his fellow Guardians crew, Rocket Raccoon must stand and face this almighty thread alone. Shot down, outnumbered and backed into a corner, Rocket arms himself to the teeth with every weapon known to Raccoon. Now it's personal!</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

## -Raccoons only live once-

 

_-KrrKKZzzTT- They're coming-KrrKKZzzTT-_

_-KrrKKZzzTT-Coming-KrrKKZzzTT-_

_..._

_-KrrKKZzzTT- he's got...lifeless eyes, black eyes, like a doll's eye. When he comes at ya, doesn't seem to be livin'. Until he bites ya and those black eyes roll over white. And then, and then you hear that terrible high pitch screamin' and the ocean turns red and spite of all the poundin' and the hollerin' they all come in and rip you to pieces. -KrrKKZzzTT-_

_..._

_..._

_-KrrKKZzzTT-They're here-KrrKKZzzTT-_

_..._

_..._

_-KrrKKZzzTT-_

_-The message repeats-_

_..._

"Now what the frakk was that about?" Rocket muttered in confusion playing the message he'd just picked up through Milano's Comm-system.

"I am Groot?"

"I know it was distress signal you dumb tree! What I meant was what was it about. Get Peter in here." He barks at Groot.

"I am Groot?"

"I know his asleep, so wake him up. I don't care if its mean. Just do it." Groot grunts his unhappy acquiescence and leaves the cockpit.

"What's so important now Rocket? I'd have asked Groot but you know-" Star-lord mumbles massaging sleepiness away from his face.

"Yeah, yeah, ya don't speak Groot. I know. So listen to this." Rocket replies playing the message to Peter who listens it with slight confusion.

"Okay, so what language is that anyway and where is it coming from? "

"Keystone, we're nearing the edges of the Galacian wall now but the language -its what's spoken at Procyon-6 and I triangulated the message to be from somewhere around that neck of the space. Remember that planet I stranded on some time ago at the keystone wilds?"

"Yeah, barely. As I recall you haven't really spoken about it since." Peter muses while fumbling with the coffee machine. He thought he might as well make some since he was now awake and his shift would start in a few hours anyway.

"It wasn't an all together pleasant experience to be honest. Anyway we're almost at the drop zone."

Rocket notes surprisingly subdued.

"So, what about that message Rock?"

"Probably nothing. I'll check it out once I get beyond the wall. Don't wait for me here. I shouldn't be gone more than a week but there's no point for you to stick around fiddling your thumbs waiting."

"You really sure about this Rocket, I mean at least you should take Groot with you in case something happens. At least you could leave us the pass codes for that forcefield so we can come after you if things get bad, you know."

"They're individually keyed Pete, I can't just 'give' them to you and what's Groot going to do? He doesn't know how to man or repair a ship any more than Drax does and my guns can take care of any rude aliens I come across. No offence Groot."

"I am Groot" The tree-man shrugs.

"You haven't even told us what it is that you want from there by having us ferrying you out here every few years... I mean I get that there's something you're not telling us and you probably have your reasons but you really aren't making this easy on us, you know." Star-lord sighs following Rocket doing his preparations before performing the EVA-maneuver to man his much smaller barely bigger than a shuttle sized spacecraft currently tethered under Milano.

"Look Pete, it really is a personal issue and I need to do it alone, okay?" Rocket affirms placing the helmet on to test the seals before strapping on his other accessories and entering the air lock.

"Sigh, I guess I can't make you change your mind. We'll good luck." Peter sighs clapping Rocket's armored shoulder as good luck charm.

"Luck has nothing to do with it and Tell Gamora & Drax I'm sorry I left without telling them but you know how I suck with goodbyes." Rocket grunts closing the air lock behind him almost hastily.

"I am Gro-oot!" Groot sighs forlornly watching Rocket's small golden ship stop at the shimmering force field before zipping on to the other side through a ship-sized hole appearing on the wall and then he was gone.

"yeah, I know buddy. Don't worry he'll be back. He always has." Peter reassures his best and only tree friend.

"Is he gone?" Gamora asks looking out the cockpit canopy stepping beside Peter & Groot.

"You should have told us of our furry friend's imminent departure." Drax rumbles displeased.

## Procyon-6

 

_-Frakk, I just hate having to navigate through a storm. It's tricky enough in a good weather to avoid the flight radars and more importantly to avoid being seen by locals. So you fly in near blind, no landing lights, in a shitty weather storm to hide the engine roar and hope for the best in finding a spot desolate enough that nobody would spot your craft come morning._ Rocket cursed in his mind doing his best to fly-by-instruments. - _There, that seemed like a decent site to land._ Kzakk! Something jolts the ship making the other engine sputter and Rocket is forced to land right here and now. Luckily the small hillock he'd spotted earlier was almost there, the ship should be easy to hide behind it.

_Oh frakk that's not a hillock it's a frackin' hay barn! and you fool had to lad right into it._ Rocket grumbles clawing his way out of the ship now covered in debris from the crash. He couldn't fully see how bad the damage was in the dark & heavy rain but his night vision was sharp enough to make out that it was probably a lightning that had damaged the engine. Nothing he couldn't fix assuming the internal parts weren't damaged beyond repair by the sudden power surge and consequent crash-landing. He hoped the people living at the farm some half a mile away across the field were still sleeping and he could get his ship out before they'd notice any authority about the wreck. Probably have to get a tow truck anyway, damn barn almost collapsed on top of the ship and it's too risky to fly it out without first making sure the engines are fine.

* * *

It took him near three hours in a dead of night to get to the nearest city which had been his destination before the crash. Hitchhiking, even if he'd manage to find someone willing, was out of the question since he was still wearing his new blue & black EVA combat flight suit and helmet with silvery highlights, mainly because of the shitty weather. It was too outlandish for him to be seen in public with it at this planet, even when he had draped a tarpaulin over it as a makeshift rain poncho to cover most of it to avoid being asked some possibly very dangerous questions from any passerby's. It was most fortunate that the city streets were almost flooded by the heavy monsoon storm. It made sneaking through the city so much easier for Rocket who thanks to his futuristic state of the art suit was mostly safe from the raging elements.

* * *

 The lodging establishment was just ahead and as usual it was still open despite the late hours. He couldn't risk Nidnene and their kits by simply walking in when there might be customers about. Rocket leaned against the wall at the alley he was huddled in, pulling the tarpaulin over his head and started to scan through local radio frequencies with the in-built systems in his helmet to pass the time and to get in touch with the local news. So far no one had gotten a scoop about someone finding his spacecraft though he was fairly certain that his luck wouldn't last for longer than possibly following night.

_It's getting late and there probably won't be too many customers about in this storm, so might as well close up the saloon a bit early._ She thought absently, sweeping the tables clean and collecting empty glasses once the last stubborn customers had left. She would have offered a room but they were already packed and letting people bunk for the night at the saloon floor was just asking for trouble. Storm season was always the best season for the reservations. Her train of thoughts were interrupted by the cloaked figure standing at the dimly lit doorway, not that the Procyonids needed that much light as they could naturally see fairly well in the dark. She frowned at the person in the doorway setting her glass filled tray and cleaning rag down on the side table.

"We're full and I'm closing up the salon. Come back tomorrow unless ye're in absolute need of something wet other than yer clothes in which case its one for the road and yer out'ta here." She announces turning her back on the stranger standing by the door to emphasize her message. The stranger seems to take this in with a slow nod and then pulls the cowl of his rain poncho back -or was it a tarpaulin with a hole cut through? Nidnene noted with slight consternation that she was seeing two reddish orbs gleaming through the visor of some kind of helmet. "Rocket... You really know how to impress a lady ye know, I was half excepting ye to be some crazy slasher or penniless hobo in that cloak." She sighs sagging a little from joy and relief of seeing him again.

Rocket moves inside from the doorway removing his helmet with a slight hissing sound coming from the seals and sets it on the table next to Nidnene's tray before letting his wet DIY-rain poncho follow, landing it in a heap on the hardwood floor, revealing the rest of his rather outlandish outfit. Though supposedly that kind of wear was the norm where ever it was that Rocket lived out there among the stars if his tales were to be believed and looking at the futuristic suit with the jetpacks strapped on the back they weren't that hard to believe. The big male steps next to her to take in her scent with sharp inhales. The strange blue hued gauntlets enclosing his paws retracted to expose his hairy finger tips as he tentatively reaches out with his palms to caress her cheeks. She reaches back slowly, working her way up along the sleeves of that odd suit -it felt so alien, that suit, her touch telling that it was smooth without any grooves which a woven cloth should have but it wasn't slick like plastic either, so strange but his face wasn't that of a stranger and as she reached to take his head between her palms he did the same, slowly pulling their each other's foreheads together and they ,rubbing them together, inhaled their mixed scent in a mutual sigh of contentment.

"I missed you so my love" He whispers quietly.

"The kits have already begun asking if ye're really up there in the sky like I've told 'em." She sighs sounding as tired and as relieved as she felt. Raising three young kits on your own while working a bed & breakfast-pub wasn't easy.

"I'm sorry it was never my intention to harm ya." He apologizes, slowly releasing from the embrace.

"I know, ye had no choice. Come on, let's get that spacesuit off before somebody sees ye in it and I'll make ye some late night supper from the dinner leftovers. " She sighs supressing a yawn, grabbing the glass tray from the table before disappearing into backroom where she lived with her kits.

"The correct term is EVA-suit." Rocket protests half-heartedly, collecting his DIY-poncho and EVA-helmet before following at her wake.

* * *

 Rocket had at first been almost amused and then annoyed with the clothes he'd been given to choose from. Rocket was actually very large & brawny for a Raccoonoid so much so that most of the clothing, left by Nidnene's male guests over the years, were ill fitting and often out of fashion even with one another. Rocket finally found a pair of black slacks and a thick white collared pleated shirt, that fit without the sleeves threatening to tear from seams if he moved his arms too lively and pants which wouldn't break from crotch when sitting down. They'd have to do for the time he was going to spend here.

Rocket was nursing his wounds from the fashion disaster with a nice pint of ale taken from the help-yourself-all-you-can-drink-tap when a group of five barely legal kids stormed in. They were clearly a bit drunk and drenched wet by the storm. The swollen belly of the girl drew Rockets eyes immediately. They stood by the door for a moment, taking stock of things before the males set their eyes on Rocket, probably thinking him to be the bouncer of the place. He certainly didn't look like the regular patrons in his pleated white collared shirt and black slacks.

"You the bouncer in this joint? Where's the waiter? We want some beer." They hollered setting provocatively around Rocket though Rocket noted the female standing a little back looking at things unfolding with a sort of sick enjoyment in her eyes that many petty manipulators had, which pointed her being the actual ringleader of this annoying posse.

"No, I'm Rocket. Who the frakk are you people? Or more precisely who the frakk are you for me to not to bash your skulls in for bothering me and loitering at my mate's place? Ye should leave if ye ain't got no money 'cause we ain't givin' emergency shelter here." Rocket grunts not feeling particularly generous in the nice guy-department at the moment.

"I'm here to ask for my maternal share. My mates here are just for the company and shelter, you understand or have you got a problem with that, _Rocket?"_ She retorts in behalf of the group pronouncing Rocket's name with a supposedly slandering sneer.

"I might..." Rocket notes gulping down the ale he'd been helping himself earlier before rising from his chair to stand up in his full height.

"Oy, Rocky! Let me handle this -Look lady I'll make a deal with ye. if ye tell yer goons to vacate me premises now I'll let ye stay 'ere for the night and give ye yer share as food by tomorrow mornin' . Alright?" Nidnene yelps attempting to placate the youngsters with promises as she's hurrying from the back-room to salon to stand behind the bar desk, alerted by the voices. All eyes turn on her and the four youngsters look at the punk haired chit of a leader expecting her word. She looks at them, then at Rocket -the big bouncer looking bloke, and then Nidnene, the mid-age nearing proprietress.

"Well how about.. NO! We want our share and we want it now." She declares with a toothy grin. five against two should be easy even if the bouncer was built like a brick shit house.

-The frakk you are!" Rocket hisses grabbing the empty pint from the counter and simultaneously smashed it against the cheek of his nearest opponent who drops immediately, out cold and bleeding, on the floor. He then heaves against the counter with his legs, pushing the three stooges away from him to get more room to fight. The three males recover quickly advancing from all sides but Rocket doesn't wait for them to make the next move, grabbing the wrist of the first one at his right and dodges the second guys clumsy fist by arching his back, pulling the guy he grabbed forward, right on path of the fist while kicking the second one at his right squarely in the stomach winding him momentarily. He then twists the wrist his still holding and wheedles around the guy, servos whirring audibly inside his arms, breaking the wrist in the process before pushing him on the other two trying to advance anew. "Fuck this" the one kicked in the guts grunts pulling out an ugly looking steel knife. His mate grins starting to circle Rocket with him. The knife wielder charges at Rocket while the other guy manages to grab Rocket's shirt collar ripping the shirt apart when Rocket tries to dodge the knife thrust. The action stops almost right there. Both scoundrels still standing, stop to stare at Rocket's upper body cybernetics gleaming metallic even at the dim light of the salon.

"What the fuck are you man!" The one still holding Rocket's tattered shirt in his paws stammers.

"Ya broke my fookin' arm!" The guy lying on the floor mumbles.

"holy crap! The hell is that sound coming from you man, just what the hell are you? You ain't normal! Yer a freak!" The knife wielder spits hefting the knife uncertainly as the cybernetic servos in Rocket make their familiar low- sounding whirr as he moves.

"Cybernetic Organism AKA Cyborg and if ya got a problem with dat -I'll gladly show ye my appreciation for the fact." Rocket grunts gritting his teeth and crouching his shoulders like a wrestler, fueling his anger into his demeanor to hide how much it hurt to hear those words.

"A cyber- what?" the shirt holder asks unfamiliar with the word.

"-s that some kinda special forces-thing or what? Let's find out how tough ye are fer real, wont we fellas?" The one with the knife quips getting slowly more emboldened.

while the males taunt Rocket, the female tearing her eyes off from them decides to use the momentary confusion to grab the cash from the unlocked till behind the counter.

Her plan fails however when Nidnene point at her in the face with an old sawed-off shotgun, rising up from behind the counter. Effectively ending the scuffle.

"Enough! Stand down Rocky and you, get yer paws of my till young lady unless ye want yer unborn to be birthed in an emergency section." She yells getting their attention. Rocket and the males stop what they're doing to look at her, fists still raised. Rocket looks at her and the female she's threatening and steps away from the males lowering his fists.

"Here's a tenner, now git out and take yer loser friends with ye before I call social security on yer ass." She declares placing a ten _corg_ bill on the counter. The female looks at her, the gun and the meager bill on the counter in front of her. She hesitates only a fraction before grabbing the bill and leaves to disappear into the night, her mates bringing the rear and leading their mate who can't walk properly after the trashing from Rocket.

"Now get the frakk out like she says and I don't hafta do it the hard way." Rocket echoes Nidnene.

"Frackas! Why'd ya let e'm leave with yer money Niddy-even if it's just a tenner? They deserve nothing but ta get in'ta chokey." Rocket turns on Nidnene as soon as the door closes.

-Oh Rocky. I sometimes keep forgetting ye ain't from aroun' 'ere. It's the maternity ruling. When yer carrying or with young ones, ye hav' tha right to ask for aid and other are obliged ta giv' but some, like that young lassie, just keep stepping over tha bound 'n proper. She'll get her kits killed one of these days unless she wises up, ye know.

-Then why haven-"

-Because I've got me pride left, that's why. I need no aid from anybody. Come on, yer supper's getting cold. I'll close the shop for the night while ye eat.

"So where'd ya hid ye ship this time?" She asks some moments later, sitting down to watch Rocket eating by the kitchen table at the backroom.

-Oh it's in a barn. A few clicks from tha city, I'll move it first thing tomorrow." Rocket shrugs between mouthfuls of stew.

* * *

At the field, where Rocket's ship had crashed through the barn, the animals were voicing their displeasure for the destruction of their shelter while a group of farmhands tried to figure out just what heck it was that had hit their barn as it certainly looked like no airplane they'd ever seen while the obvious answer was just too ridiculous to be voiced despite being right in front of them... UFO's yeah right, ha-ha who'd believe in UFO's?


	2. Chapter 2

CH 2

 

By morning the storm had abated into a low drizzle and Rocket awoke to the sun shining on his face from the cracks between the window blinds. But that wasn't what awoke him from asleep at the tiny living room's sofa, what had woke him up were the three tiny raccoon faces peering at him. They were all wearing fairly simple outfits of T-shirt and trousers. One of them is clearly bigger than the rest, so likely the firstborn, the other two are harder to distinguish by age but between the two, one has a small Mohawk like growth of hair and the other one looks like his constantly thinking something. Rocket couldn't help but think them as cute as buttons.

"Are you daddy? mommy says don't wake daddy at the sofa but you look like hobo and mommy says don't talk to hobo but ye'r not hobo if ye'r in our sofa." The Mohawk wielder comments on Rocket's unkempt appearance and sounds rather proud of his 'reasoning'.

"Daddy is living in the sky dummy. This isn't daddy. It's just a hobo." The biggest one comments unimpressed.

"You're the dummy hobo, Trey. I'm telling you that's daddy!" Mohawk retorts turning on his brother.

"No, you are!" Trey declares starting to wrestle with the Mohawk wielder on the floor.

"If you ain't daddy like Duo says. Then why does mommy say don't wake daddy on the sofa? Why didn't you stay at sky daddy?" The philosophical looking one asks, staring at him with his big wet dark eyes and had he sucked his thumb as well, Rocket would have probably melted. He momentarily feels utterly lost for words.

"I missed you and your momma." He finally replies when the kit tugs his arm impatiently to stop him from zoning, turning his attention on the kits wrestling on the floor. The kit follows his gaze and shrugs in most child-like manner. "Trey and Duo always fight and then mommy tells them to stop and puts Trey and Duo on cooling corners."

Rocket yawns, finally getting up from the sofa. At least he had thought of wearing his E.V.A suit's under layers as makeshift nightclothes before going to bed. There was no need in his mind to showcase his cybernetics and cause their kits nightmares about their 'daddy' being an 'alien robot'. The apparently youngest one almost immediately jumps up and climbs on Rocket's shoulders and curls his tail around Rocket's neck like a scarf, which he doesn't mind too much since the kit weights hardly nothing to him. "uu- soft." the kit mumbles, probably about the fabric he was waddling at his paws. "Please don't." Rocket absently slaps the tiny paws away to make the kit stop. The long sleeved grey mid-layer suit was a bit sensitive to tight creases not to mention the kits sharp claws possibly puncturing it.

"Okay, that's enough. Knock it off boys!" He grunts lifting both kits effortlessly up from the floor by the loose skin at the back of their necks. "Let's see if mommy's made breakfast yet." He announces marching to the family kitchen -separate from the actual main one. Youngest of his kits riding between his shoulders and the two 'fighting men' held separately, one in each outstretched hands.

Rocket set the kits down and loose once he was sure they weren't going to start squabbling again immediately and started to look for breakfast ingredients from cupboards and kitchen closets. Nidnene had left a note on the table explaining that she had needed to make a quick dash at the market to get some dinner supplies for the paying guests and that Rocket should get something for the kits and himself from the pantries while she was away. Rocket folds the note into his pocket trying to decide what to do as breakfast.

"Okay kits, while I'm happy to let ye call me daddy. I do have a name and its Rocket. So what's yours boys?" Rocket asks conversationally while making some porridge and pancakes -some of the few foods he knew he wouldn't bungle up. Well assuming the weird green leathery feeling 'egg' was what it looked like and the flour was indeed baking flour of some kind. While he was brilliant tactician, astonishing engineer and gadget maker, he'd never been much of a chef.

"Rocket? That's a funny name." Trey giggles innocently enough until Duo smacks him on the shoulder and Trey returns it in force, causing Rocket to get in between them again. He looks at the kits for a moment before coming to a realization and decision which in hindsight seemed conspicuously familiar to the kits judging by the way they almost initiated it just by themselves without much prompting from Rocket. In other words putting Trey and Duo to sit on the opposite ends of the kitchen table, with Uno in the middle, seemed to be the most viable tactic to keep them from constantly 'sparring' while he was trying to make a breakfast.

"Well, I do know that ye two rug rats are Trey & Duo but what's ye name young man?" Rocket asks from Uno in his most jovial tone while dividing the pancakes and porridge for the kids and himself at the table.

"Don't tell him Uno. His just trying to bribe u' with pancakes." Trey snaps and gets a sudden ups-look on his face.

"Ahh-ha! so, its Uno, Duo and Trey, so which one of you is the oldest?" Rocket nods with a toothy grin. Sure he could have just asked it from Nidnene but it felt nice to chat with the kits, get to know them and... at least try being as close to a 'normal parent' as someone like him could ever get.

"I'm oldest. Then Uno and Duo is the runt." Trey announces proudly with a self-assured nod, having artfully cock-blocked his 'rivals' from answering.

"Well, eat up kits so I can bribe you with pancakes again tomorrow." Rocket promises digging in on his share. All three kits cheer eagerly at the prospect of being bribed again tomorrow.

* * *

Rocket was cleaning up the last of the dishes by the sink when Nidnene returned seeming slightly flustered. She stops to look around at the kitchen before looking worriedly at Rocket. "Where's the kits, Rocket?"

"Oh they went outside to play with the neighbors kits, but don't worry I made them some breakfast before that." Rocket replies finishing with the dishes.

"I- I think ye better go git 'em in." She mumbles looking rather dazed which made Rocket frown in worry. "Okay, what's wrong Nidnene? You look like you've seen your dead relatives."

"I- I think I just saw a big storm forming up, Rocket. That's all" She sighs sitting tiredly on the kitchen chair.

Rocket looked at his wife in askance, still not understanding why she seemed so concerned over a storm brewing, they were fairly common at this time of the year here. "Sure, I'll go get them. Where'd ye think they're usually hanging around when with friends?" Rocket promises though he'd rather not leave her right now, she seemed... unstable somehow, almost as if in shock.

"I dunno, at the public sports park usually." She sighs trembling slightly. _Yep she'd definitely seen something bad but was still too shocked to say it out aloud and thus admit what she'd seen to be real._ Rocket noted silently and poured a cup of brandy for her. "Here drink that, it'll help a little, I'll be back soon with the kits." He promises before leaving to get his suit and weapons from the basement where he'd hid them earlier.

When he came back to kitchen he noted that Nidnene was still there and seemed a bit less shaky though the content in the bottle at the table had lowered quite a bit. _It might actually be best if she'd just pass out. Always helped me in dealing with bad shit._ Rocket thought pulling his makeshift poncho over his head before walking out the backdoor. The green tarpaulin looked positively ridiculous but it was still less conspicuous than what was concealed underneath it and inside the ladies shoulder bag. Luckily Nidnene wasn't in a state to care if her prized Ucci got banged up.

* * *

The moments between stepping out of the door and walking along the short alley to peer along the borough's main street, made him realize he wouldn't have needed to bother. Horrifyingly familiar shadows of great, ugly and spiky looking ships loomed over the sky. There were bodies on the streets and at that moment he knew; everything would die. The sky was as red as the blood being shed. A threat of annihilation hung above this earth, staring down menacingly. Under its gaze, the planet’s populace trembled in fear. As the world's army futilely warred above, the people stood paralyzed. Silent. They faced extinction, the end of everything they knew. But there was only silence. The pungent smell of gasoline, oil and rot was prevalent as the horrifying Zom-troops advanced, fires crackled, spreading all over the weeping city. Buildings and people died, crying out as they crumbled around the gathered crowds, but no one moved. They stood, eyes glazed over, like deer in headlights. All there was, was destruction. Their defending forces falling like dominoes, life was snuffed out without notice. Bullets and plasma cut through the air, as one army fought for survival and the other for conquest over the earth and sky. As the panic spread through the City, the gathered crowds knew too that their world would not end in fire and ice, only in blackness of death. Heroes fell as peace and order that had stood for centuries gave way to the sheer destruction that was upon them. Not an inch of land would not be touched by ash, and not one person was not witnessing the incursion from another world. The explosions up above went largely unnoticed by the frozen and quiet populace. They knew the truth. This was the very end. Everything would die. The Badoon war hosts were here though nobody; except the one who knew, would call them as that at the time. To them the Badoon were simply death.

 


	3. Chapter 3

**Ch 3**

 

He hated the Badoon and not just because of his instincts & conscience both screaming at him how the only good Badoon was a dead Badoon. It was hard to find a race more blood thirsty, jingoistic and downright nihilistic in their pragmatism than the Badoon in the whole local group of those four Galaxies he'd sworn to guard and now those smelly lizards were here. How? He didn't know but he was going to find out. Yet the more pressing matter was to find his kits and get them back home safely through this mess.

Rocket stopped at the alley end to put on his helmet from the bag he was carrying and threw the hood of his 'cloak' over it. He scanned the streets with the visor's enhanced vision but the helmet's tactical display marked only Zom's and citizens. The war-commander of the Badoon battle-group commanding the Zom troops should have been cloaked nearby unless... Yes, there. He was about a hundred yards away, likely wearing that typical golden hued, segmented Badoon combat armor. Only the faintest ripple in the air giving him away. Rocket gritted his teeth in frustration. If only he'd have his usual arsenal. The pair of 'squirt guns' he carried as a sidearm were not even close enough to be powerful enough to penetrate the automated personal force field, which he knew from experience, the commander would have. No, what he'd have needed was at least a 4MW-Gauss riffle or similar with solid tungsten carbide or morbidium alloy slugs but he had neither. Hell, he'd have settled even with an outdated maser riffle over the two undersized photon pistols he was carrying in his person. All he could do was to gnash his teeth and mutely watch the Zom's rounding up the small group, the remnants of civilians from a destroyed bus, they hadn't just outright killed. Suddenly the opportunity presented itself, the cloaked Badoon had placed himself next and under to a wall which had a weakened structural integrity... Rocket aimed carefully and emptied a precision barrage from his photon pistols on the cracked second story wall above the Badoon. Predictably the already weakened wall gave way with a groan, flattening the near invisible Badoon which rendered the Zom's immobile for a short period, once their handler perished. Rocket expertly used it to his advantage by dashing out from the alley to shoot down the dozen or so Zoms herding the citizens. The people he'd just saved stared at him almost dumbfound. They had no idea who this sudden savior was, staring uncertainly at him and the recently slain Zom's and their Badoon master flattened under the masonry.

"Well, ye wanna live forever or what? Grab those guns and go get yer families out of the city. Now Move it people!" Rocket lifts the visor to glare at the befuddled group before running away without sparing the time to look back to see if they did what they were told to do.

He had gained maybe two blocks and the sports park was just ahead with not that many Zoms between him and his goal, though even one was enough when you took it's possible handler into account as well. He was about to move out, noticing that the Zom troops were moving away, when he heard muted chatter  and rustle of footfalls not too far behind him.

"I'm sure he went this way." A voice argued.

"Ya think so?" A second voice questioned mildly.

"Yah, I'm sure, look if that guy's willing and able to kill these 'things'..." The first one retorted back.

"Yah, come on guys... let's just find this guy." A third voice placated his companions.

 _Civilians!_ Rocket froze in his hideout behind the debris from the ruined buildings to wait and see why this gaggle of idiots was following him. He gritted his teeth and reached out with his hand to pull the last one of the bunch towards him by the scruff of the neck when they were about to walk right past him. The man he grabbed yelped in panic but Rocket subdued it by muzzling the guy with his gauntleted hand. As predicted they stopped and turned around immediately to see where their friend had suddenly vanished.

"The hell ye idiots think yer doing? I thought I told ye to go get yer families and get out." He cursed pushing the guy he'd grabbed back towards his mates and stepped into their view while making a quick scan along the streets to be sure that none of the Badoon had heard or seen them. They looked at him with a kind of awe you usually reserved for rock stars. Star-lord might have loved it but Rocket found it mostly annoying.

"Umm...well ahh -sir, most of us ain't got no family left anymore... So we figures ye could help us to fight dem invaders as ye seemed kinda handy with dem." It was good that Rocket had his helmet on to conceal his facial expressions or his dumbfound and utterly disbelieving look might have demoralized them on the spot.

"That's not... Look I ain't got the time fer this. Just tell me; did ye seen three wee kits and a bunch of older ones heading this way?" Rocket sighs pushing the gun back to the youngster's arms, noticing that this would-be Rambo barely even knew how to hold the standard Badoon assault plasma war riffle properly let alone shoot with it. It was likely that his friends were no better.

"Might have, not sure. We've been too busy with just staying alive." They admitted looking at their each others as if trying to recall whose dumb idea it had originally been to start following Rocket.

Rocket glared at the quintet. He wanted them to get lost but realized that with all the Badoon patrols around they were as good as dead if someone saw them -even with guns to shoot back, and without guns they'd probably get recaptured and sent to slave sorting points in short order.

"I'm Ashen -Ashen Long tree but you can call me Ash. So what do you want to do next?" The self appointed group leader asks introducing himself. Obviously still not quite realizing what it really meant that the Badoon were conquering their planet or he wouldn't have seemed so cheery, Rocket surmised.

"Well then, they're your boys now Ashen and IF you lot do what I say and obey without stupid questions I'll consider not to leave you for those Flarkin' lizards. Ye getting me?" Rocket consents feeling his time running out. The DIY-poncho, no longer needed, Rocket peeled away, wadding it into a roll before pushing it to one of his new 'underlings' care. The quintet stared mouth open at his EVA combat-suit even though the helmet and gloves should have already given them a few clues of what was concealed underneath the cloak.

 

Rocket holstered his still smoking pistols feeling his heart skip a beat at the sight of the sports park. The oval concrete sports stadium at the right corner of the mesh fenced park area had partially collapsed under heavy orbital firing and there were clear signs of mortar fire here and there on the left section ballparks as well. The place wouldn't be able to take another hit without crumbling completely. The remains of the three Zoms at his vicinity he mostly ignored.

"Keep yer eyes open Ash. There's no knowing if or when the Badoon are coming back to check on that patrol I just destroyed." Rocket warns his new team leader as they fan out to scout the park for his kits and other survivors. Ash nods in response trying very carefully not to look at the smoldering corpses in passing.

He watched them scurry away in pairs amongst the ruined park before following suit. The stadium felt eerily quiet which was probably for the best as it didn't seem very structurally safe anymore. There were big cracks in the concrete walls and ceilings of the passages leading below the grandstand with chunks missing from here and there.

On places the ruble from collapsed structure had blocked the corridors forcing him to take detours and it was near one such dead end where he though he heard something, it felt almost like a whisper coming from one the locker rooms at the end of the corridor.

"Uno! Duo!, Trey! You in there kits?" he called frantically, daring to raise his voice to a shout and felt his heart leap with elation when a child's voice called back. "We're in here mister, please help us! Our friend's hurt real bad!" It was a familiar voice but not one belonging to any of his kits. It sounded like that older kit he'd seen with his own this morning. It didn't mean he'd even think of leaving them trapped in there. No matter whose kits they might be.

"How many of you are in there. Is anyone else hurt?"

"Six and Just Trey, Mister Rocket!" the kit's voice yells back sounding quite frightened which was understandable.

He considered clearing the smaller debris but gave up, realizing that disturbing the debris pile wasn't safe. It was already partially holding the weight of the roof on this side that was sagging quite precariously and disturbing the piles of ruble might force the ceiling to cave in fully.

"Hey Kit, is there another way in? like a window or something."

"Yeah on the back wall but we can't reach it, it's too high."

"Hang on, I'll be right back." Rocket promises running off to gather his team before mounting a rescue operation.

Once Rocket had located his group, finding the right windows from the outside of the building was easy. They were conveniently at almost ground level and luckily big enough for the adults to squeeze in.

"So how are we going to get in? There's bars on the inside and they're locked too?"Ashen comments pulling and poking at the basement windows which wouldn't budge even a little.

"Leave it to me." Rocket shrugs turning his trusty old plasma knife on with a flash. The men gathering around him stare at it in amazement, having never seen such a thing in their lives except maybe in fiction. Rocket doesn't pay much attention to it, concentrating on cutting one of the windows out by tracing the plasma blade along the gap between the frames and masonry. The window soon gives in with a gentle push.

"Get in! We look mighty suspicious out here in the open, armed and huddled up in a bunch like this." Rocket grumbles ushering his mates to climb in before following suit.

The Inside was dim, dusty and messy as could be expected but despite all the visual obstructions Rocket wouldn't have needed his helmet visor's life sign detector or other enhanced sensor arrays to tell him the number of people in the vicinity. It took an effort in his part to not rush in and scoop his two kits into a bear hug instead of focusing on what was around him. He could easily recognize the kit he'd spoken with earlier as the oldest of the bunch, the two other's he didn't know were probably around the same age as he was. Uno and Duo seemed alright though they were all pretty shaken up. They all looked at him and the other adults if not exactly scared then worriedly and perhaps with a hint of hope that everything could be alright after all.

"You kits all right, none of you got hurt?" He asks fighting to keep his voice level and opens his helmet visor since it seemed to freak the kits out a little that he had 'no face'. That pretty much opens the emotional flood gates as his kits pretty much tackle him over yelling daddy in relief and something pretty much incomprehensible about Trey, before he can say another word in.

"Okay, hush, easy now- what's happened and where's Trey?" He tries again hugging his kits back in earnest and generally trying to get them to calm down. Again it's the oldest kit who responds a bit timidly. "Over there. Some debris fell over him and his feet got trapped and we were too afraid to move any of it. I- I think he might be dead. He ain't moving no more so I covered him up with me jacket." Rocket bit back an angry retort, taking calming breaths instead. He lowered the visor back down to look through it at the jacket covered heap that was lying next to a big pile of ruble blocking the locker room exit. Something which he hadn't paid immediate attention to when entering.

No Trey wasn't dead, but the visor pointed the life signs as decreasing. "Don't you fret, Trey isn't dead yet. Come on help me get him out." He orders, sounding once again more cool than he actually felt.

Removing the jacket revealed Trey's face to have that pale unhealthy look which Rocket knew from experience to be a sign of major blood loss. Hopefully it wasn't due to internal injuries.

"Is any of you a doctor by any chance?" He asks wadding the jacket under Trey's feet to keep them higher than his head. The kit had barely stirred despite being moved and even slapped a little by Rocket in hopes of evoking a response.

"You wish, none of us ain't even so much as a vet." The self-appointed leader of his group notes ruefully.

Rocket bit his lip in frustration. While his helmet had a medi-scan software installed, it was rudimentary -meant for quick field dressing only. The raw data was helpful in telling what was wrong but not much use for fixing up anything beyond bruises without a trained professional. Currently it pointed both legs as being compose fractured and bleeding though apparently Trey was otherwise only superficially bruised and the weight of the ruble was compressing the legs, keeping him from bleeding out.

"Put these around his thighs." Rocket says taking a pair of auto-tourniquets from the medical kit he always kept by his side as a part of his suit, before starting to prepare and load an automatic hypodermic syringe with an ampoule of blue liquid taken from a selection of various small ampoules representing all the colors of the rainbow.

"What's that?" Both the adults and kits ask in near unison.

"Kree combat steroids... this stuff can make even dead to rise." Rocket replies flatly, leaving out the fact that he was guessing how much of the full dose, pre-calculated to himself, he could give to a young Kit like Trey without killing him outright.

"We'll dig him out once I've administered the drug. Ready?" Rocket orders knowing that if his miscalculated Trey would die as surely as leaving his legs under the pile would. So it's not really a choice at all from his part when he plunges the automated hypodermic needle against his sons arm.

It was very hard to keep his emotions in check when Trey began to stir. "Hey bud, how ya feelin'?" He asks trying to sound reassuring.

"It hurts daddy... It hurts." The kit mumbles and whinnies even more loudly when his being dug free, pulled out and transferred to makeshift stretchers Rocket's group had fashioned from the rain poncho and iron bars loosened free from the ruble. "Hush my brave son... I know, I know. We'll get you out. You're going to be alright." Rocket hushes, brushing his son's head gently when he is about to start fidgeting because of pain despite the drugs, while his legs were hastily splinted and bandaged before moving out.

 

## Later in the evening

 

"What are they doing Chief-Ranger Guardian Rocket?" Ashen whispers laying on his belly with Rocket at the roof a high building, spying on the Badoon activity. Rocket rises his helmet visor to look at Ash in the eyes before replying grimly. "They're turning the city into enclosed perimeter as I predicted and stop calling me that. It's just Rocket!" He hisses already regretting he revelation of his formal titles to his small seed group of guerillas.

"So, like a fence. Why is that such a bad thing Chief-Ranger?" Ashen asks making Rocket groan again inaudibly.

"It means the Badoon are readying a prison enclosure and once they're done... You really don't want to experience what happens after." He mutters baring his teeth in a snarl.

"Ohh, that's bad then isn't it?" Ashen nods, slowly starting to understand.

"To put it mildly. Come on we've more things that needs to be done before they're finished with it." Rocket replies already starting to climb down from their high vantage.

 


	4. Chapter 4

 

**Ch 4**

Ashen and Rocket return back to their makeshift headquarters at Nidnene's Inn at daybreak of the following morning. Rocket seems absent and closed up, barely even noticing Nidnene or the new people milling about, walking straight up to the bar to get a stiff drink while Ashen is subtly nursing a notable bruise in his left cheek.

"Rock-"Nidnene starts but Ashen blocks her though not too unkindly. "Let the man have his drink."

"Why, what's happened?" She asks growing slightly alarmed now.

"We saw those- ehh what was the name that Chief Ranger uses? Baboon, Bedoo -ahh Badoon, yeah Badoon. Anyway, we saw them using the captives to build some kind of fenced enclosures with some kind of facility at the centre and a start for larger walls at the eastside of the city. He then wanted to get a closer look on one of those odd structures they had erected on the north-side of town and told me to wait until he would get back... So when he got back there was this big explosion a few minutes later. And well, he was kind of like his now the whole way back, and when I tried to pry in on what he'd seen or done in there; he punched me on the face and told me to 'shut the flark up'. So I dunno, I mean I-" Ashen rambles disjointedly until Nidnene cuts him off with a sharp gesture. "Alright let me handle Rocket. Go make sure we're all set for the daytime lockdown and sort a team to continue digging."

"Yes ma'am." Ashen mutters watching Nidnene disappear into saloon to find her mate.

 

"It's already begun Nidnene... I can't stop them. I can slow this but not stop it, not with what I have. In five days, maybe sooner, it's going to be all over for us. You, me, the kits, this city, everyone! We're all going to die. This, Everything I've done so far. It's nothing but a losing strategy." Rocket admits with a ragged sigh settling an empty glass of liquor down on the desk when Nidnene comes to stand behind him by the bar desk and starts to rub his shoulders in comforting manner.

"That bad, huh? I'm sure there's a silver lining still on the clouds." She comments urging Rocket to continue.

"Ye don't understand. None of ye do, ye don't know the Badoon like I do. Ye are just, just -Look, ye just don't get it. This planet is too primitive." Rocket protests shaking his head in disgust.

"Well I'm no off-worlder and have never met 'a Baddon' before yesterday but what I do know- Is that the man I fell in love with doesn't give up this easily." Nidnene retorts sternly, turning Rocket around to face her in the swivel bar stool his sitting on, to look him in the eyes. Rocket snorts indignantly and turns back to his drinking, but before he can refill Nidnene clamps her paw on top of the glass. "Look at me Rocket. I'm serious. Ya can't drink them away, not now, not ever. There's not enough booze in the world to wash yer past and present pains away."

"Doesn't change the past or the facts, true-but it makes them more bearable. Might as well have a good buzz before the inevitable." Rocket grumbles, showing her lightly and violently yanks the glass back from under Nidnene's paw, failing to notice her darkening gaze.

"Yawant facts? Well I'll give ya some facts -Right now the survival of about two hundred people is directly depending on ye, including me and our kits and everyone of those two hundred are willing to follow yer lead. Those two hundred who are here, lurking in my basement, attic space and every which were because they had heard rumors that this 'robot dude's been keeping me lodging parlor as his resistance base and could keep 'em safe from the invaders." She retorts shaking a finger in front of his face.

"Two hundred already? No wonder it felt oddly crowded when I got back with Ash..."

"Yes! And ye're allegedly the Chief Ranger of Halfworld, Custodian of the Keystone quadrant and The Guardian of the galaxy. So put the booze down and act like The Ranger guardian ya claim to be, for Makers sake! If ya still think that boozing is the most important thing in your life since giving ye best shot to fight those invaders and saving yer family is too much for ye stomach... Well by all means, and don't let the cork hit the bottle and the door to your ass on the way out." Nidnene continues to heatedly  berate Rocket and stalks out like an angry cat without waiting for a reply.

"Well, frakk me..." Rocket mopes looking at the bottle and glass in front of him before pushing them aside, having suddenly lost his desire to drink. However it didn't prevent him from snatching the bottle with him when he left the bar.

* * *

He was tired and his cybernetics felt sore, all the more reasons to go find a place to crash but first... Rocket sighs deeply and takes a good swig from the bottle his carrying at the crook of his arm before descending down into basement.

He stood by the mouth of the room at the darkened basement, observing, saying nothing. He almost expected Nidnene's low but angry hiss to warn him not to enter while intoxicated, she often slept with the kits, but it wasn't her voice in the dark that Rocket heard. Trey's quiet whimper was no surprise. They had been very lucky to find a doctor for Trey - especially a surgeon at that. Even most of the retired ones had been called in to help when the Badoon had attacked. Those broken legs would cause a lot of pain for a long while. Rocket was in truth more worried about Uno and Duo, tossing and turning in their fit of sleep. They had been very subdued ever since and it worried him. Worried him a great deal. Part of him ached to whisper in their ears how everything would be all right while rocking them at his arms until they would fall asleep.

"Then why don't cha?" Nidnene asks softly from behind him making him almost jump from surprise enough to nearly drop the bottle he was holding. She'd always been scary good at sneaking and reading his moods.

"I- I don't know if I should." He finally admits after a long pause.

"Don't know. What'ca mean? Yer their father. There's nothing wrong in wanting to hold and comfort them." She comments with a raised eyebrow.

"I never had anyone to -to teach me or do those things... to me. I'm not even sure if I've had biological parents at all. We look alike but we're not the same you and I, not quite."

"Well ya certainly couldn't have been borne without at least a mother, that's fer sure and our kits were born fine so we're similar in what really counts. Despite what differences ya might think we have." Nidnene assures with notable certainty.

Rocket just gives her one of his 'honey, you don't even want to know the answer to that' -looks making Nidnene roll her eyes a little and sigh "just go to bed Rocky -but not here. Not tonight anyway, yer drunk and I'm not in the mood fer this kinda talks."

 Rocket's mute glowering turns into a pained look of fear and horror from spikes of sudden pain at his lower-back. He drops on his knees panting shallowly, supporting himself against the wall with one hand while squeezing his eyes shut and pushing a fist into his mouth to avoid from screaming it out loud.

"Rocket? What is it. Ya alright?" Nidnene yells rushing to his side, looking mighty concerned.

"Ye- ye shouldn't see me like this. It's... It's nothing, I'm fine." He lies to her between his teeth. He squeezed his eyes shut as even the dim light of the corridor hurt his suddenly super light sensitive eyes. He was not alright and he'd never would be. The bastards at Halfworld had seen to that with their diabolical experiments and he'd rather die than let anyone else to know how they had broken his body and mind again and again. Oh they'd tried to 'soften' things by offering him nominally prestigious and important duties later on, in hopes of 'buying' his trust back... But he knew better by then.

"The hell ya are! I'm yer mate, damn it! Ya either tell me what's wrong with ya or I'll call the Doc to have a look and then everyone here will know fer sure." Nidnene threatens taking a hold of Rocket and despite her earlier notions against it, part drags part leads him into their sleeping quarter and lies him down on the biggest pallet laid on the floor between their kits. Rocket lies there motionless for a good five minutes just breathing in and out very steadily and very regularly which to Nidnene seemed something which her often needlessly secretive mate had practiced aplenty.

"No more secrets Rocky. How long has this been going on, these -strokes of pain, I mean." She asks when Rocket is finally able to crack his eyes open again.

"All my life, ever since I left Halfworld. There's no 'cure' for it. This pain is a part of me, always has been and always will be."

"Stop being so melodramatic Rock, it doesn't suit ya." Nidnene sighs caressing his cheek.

"I wish, but it's the truth; sometimes days, weeks even months can go by and there's almost no pain at all and sometimes... sometimes it's even worse than now."

"But surely there must be something, I mean ya always tout how advanced everything is out there."

"It's complicated. Ye know how I have all these metal parts sticking through my back and other places?"

"The cibe- cypo- cipher-net wares?" Nidnene nods fumbling with the foreign word.

"They're just the tip of the iceberg. I have a catalogue worth of cybernetics in me. Ya can't even begin to realize the extent... Even I don't know how it all quite works and.. And when there's as much as I have in a person, there's a price to pay." Rocket admits in pain induced honesty.

"How's that related to pain relief?  I mean, ye're clearly not a robot in fur suit. You've convinced me of that quite well over the years... and certain flesh parts seemed to be working quite well, the last time we checked." She responds with slightly mischievous innuendo.

"Would you be offended if I say 'not tonight honey, I'm having a headache' " Rocket replies coughing up a weak laugh.

"No, but ya skirted me question." She sighs resting her head against Rockets burly chest. Rocket might be large for a raccoonoid but the others; the taller and larger humanoid races, wouldn't describe raccoonoids as nothing but small, thin or even scrawny no matter how much they'd work-out and Rocket despite his impressive build of 55 pounds and 3'4" was no exception.

"I have something called chemical warfare modification-set. It filters out or makes inert most everything that's not designed to pass the filters. I've tried a lot of drugs and pain remedies but the only ones I know to work properly are Kree manufactured combat steroids -illegal in three worlds out of four outside the Kree-empire You saw how strong they are -I gave Trey only tenth of what I'd use myself. Groot bark tea and enough alcohol for a normal guy to pass out are the next best."

"So that's why ye're constantly hitting the bottle! Why didn't ya tell me? Like years ago already! instead of letting me nag on and on about it while ya suffered."

"Well, I... I guess I was afraid that you'd think less of me if ye knew I was such a weakling." Rocket admits reluctantly which made Nidnene to shake her head in mild disbelief. "After all this time Rocket, ya really think I'd revoke our _coupling agreement_ because of something as trivial as that?"

"All this time... and now time is not something we hav- Ahh" Rocket yelps with grimace as a new wave of muscle spasms hit him.

"Is it true Rocky? about what the astrophysicists say... about time." Nidnene asks absently while massaging Rocket's back to ease his muscle pains. "Time? What about it. What did they say?" Rocket replies tiredly.

"That it's all relative -like if I'd wait here for ye and when you'd come back ye would be an old man by then or we would be but you'd be young, because of space bending time differently between places or something, it's was kind of confusing -I heard them talk about it in the news before yesterday, some new theory, and now we're not so relatively or figuratively about to run out of time..." She replies voice cracking a little at the end when she realized that she's babbling. Rocket turns his head to glance backwards at Nidnene kneading his aching back, knowing that she didn't usually talk like this. "Nidnene, ye're the love of me life. I'd rather spend the last seconds of me life with ye than an eternity without but time, space- and time-space continuum in particular doesn't really work quite like that, well unless using the slower-than-light engines to travel between the solar systems but trust me when I say we'll never grow old apart." Rocket promises hugging and kissing her fiercely.

* * *

If Rocket though he'd get a nice & quiet rest with his wife after their reconciliation, he was sadly mistaken. Not even three hours had passed before he was vigorously shaken awake by his followers.

"Get yer flarking paws of me you dolts!" Rocket grumbles angrily. The small group of men back way to wait for him to get up and dress in the dark.

"Now what the frakk is so important that I can't have even a moments rest?" He asks pulling a shirt over his head.

"The baduuns are up to something Guardian Ranger Rocket. We figures ye might want to hear this right away." It takes a moment for Rocket to connect the voice with a face. Roork Shade water was one of those people who tended to surprise you. A baker's apprentice with a real knack for military work, but Rocket hadn't been a one to look a gift horse in the mouth and had promptly placed him as the de facto 'home guard' leader.

"Right, let's go and have a look then." Rocket's agreement is accompanied by a wide yawn. The men lead him a short way outside and into a recently abandoned warehouse. Rocket could only hope the people there had fled and not gotten captured. He frowns slightly at the locale.

Rocket grunts a question to Roork when his been led into basement who only nods indicating them to be quiet. At the foot of the stairs,laying in the ground few feet from them was what had once been a Raccoonoid in tattered clothes, only now it was but a twisted mockery of its self. If it hadn't moved but moments ago, Rocket wouldn't have thought it to be living. At least not until it tried biting and grabbing at them and those black eyes rolled over showing the whites. And they heard that terrible high pitched screamin' before it had turned on them in full. Only it was chained to a wall with a thick chain by the waist and ankles. Rocket's guns flew into his hands out of sheer instincts, spitting a hail of photon death on the poor soul. it takes second or two for Rocket to realize that his helmet's visor hadn't registered the creature as living at all. In fact it had barely registered it at all until it moved to attack. Rocket shivered, recalling those lifeless, empty black eyes, like a doll's eyes. "Okay that's trouble alright. A glarkin' frackin' heap of trouble. Have you finished with those tunnels yet?" He notes holstering his guns and tries not to look too visibly shaken.

"No, not quite but when a word of... that _thing_ spreads, we're not going to get short on diggers for sure." Roork replies looking at the now truly dead corpse with a visible shudder.

"Where'd ya boys found it, Roork?" Rocket asks examining the cadaver carefully for any signs of typical Badoon 'tampering'.

"It was wondering outside near here and we first thought it was a crazed citizen... But we figured that mistake real fast and dragged it down here in chains before fetching ye." Roork Explains nonchalantly, trying to hold on to his cool.

"Well it doesn't have the usual Zom-hardware... Could be some kind of nano-machine or techno-viral weapon infection. I've seen both, ya know. Though I  was pretty sure the Badoon weren't that far advanced yet. I sure hope ye boys used gloves when manhandling that thing." Rocket contemplates worriedly and made point to not touch anything on the corpse.

"Eww, Ye suppose we lucked on that things then and aren't going to... Ya know 'turn or nothin'?" Roork whistles from between his teeth and some of the men with them look a bit sick at the notion of 'turning'.

"I dunno. We likely won't know unless one of ya keels over all sudden like and we wouldn't want that, now would we?" Rocket notes sarcastically.

"How's this even possible? That's just twisted! The dead are supposed to stay dead" Ashen mutters in disgust.

"Badoon science has made some very nasty discoveries on the nature of life & death, Ash. This and that hulking monster are but some of the ways they have to replenish their ranks during and after a new conquest. Come on let's get back to Inn. We need to redouble our efforts to find people still hiding and move everybody out into city maintenance network tunnels, by tonight. The Badoon patrols are almost here." Rocket replies with a tone that warns his men not ask too much while they're spying on the lone Monster of Badoon from the crack between the warehouse's double doors, waiting for it to stomp away along the street. Though it was all alone and without a group -it also didn't need it. A single monster could rip a tank apart with ease and their rock hard skin could withstand astonishing amount of punishment but the monster on the street wasn't what had made his skin crawl.


	5. Chapter 5

Ch 5

 

The sun was just about to set when Rocket was informed that the main tunnel had been reached. He looks up from his latest project to regard Ashen's beaming face.

It had been hard work to dig through those twenty feet down and then fifty straight trough hard earth with nothing but shovels and picks but the fact that the soil around here was mostly compacted clay and silt and the main tunnel itself was laid from bricks, instead of being mined into bedrock, made the digging so much easier. Which was why Rocket had ordered the access tunnel to be dug from the Inn's basement in the first place.

"Good work lads. Anyone gone down there yet?" Rocket asks whiskers twitching from anticipation though only part of his attention was divided to Ash, the rest given to the weird looking cylindrical contraption at the table in front of him.

"No, but it should be safe to use even though it's too dark to see even your own paws in there, without a light. These tunnels were regularly maintained until just a few days ago." Ashen explains with a bit of pride in his voice for the work they had completed.

"Right, put a few guys with good ears down there to listen -we need to be sure the Badoon haven't gained access to the tunnels yet. Also tell people to gather on the saloon within an hour once the morning rations have been served. I have a few announcements to make." Rocket orders setting the metal cylinder down, fiddling with his guns at his lap now.

"As you order Guardian-Ranger Rocket." Ashen replies saluting smartly before scurrying off to fulfil the tasks. Rocket frowns lightly at the salute. Last time he checked they weren't official anything and most certainly not any kind of an army. He sighs deep, feeling tired from the lack of sleep and worry for his people. His impeccable tactical sense told him their odds against the Badoon and they weren't good. He sighs again, donning his helmet before reassembling and holstering his photon pistols and screwing the end cap in place that finishes this particular 'project'.

"I wish they would stop doing that. "Rocket mutters to Nidnene standing next to him while she's doling out the daily breakfast rations to their 'troops' (though it was technically supper time) when a forth male person in row gives Rocket a quick salute and some females offer a small curtsy. "Well, taking charge of things tends to do that." She whispers seeming amused. "This isn't a game woman! People are going to die because of this." Rocket growls under his breath. "And a lot more would if it weren't for you. So what's really eating you now Rock?" Nidnene shrugs opening a new cardboard box containing some kind of canned preservatives. Snaives by the smell of it, Rocket deduces wrinkling his nose silently. "What's eating me? Well, nothing -okay pretty much all of this. We're in deep frack and they're all just so Krutacking chipper about-" Rocket's grumble is interrupted by Nidnene's remark."Well why don't you start thinking about how to 'unfrack' things then? Sure, we probably are in deep shit here but that's no reason for throwing your axe in the well and running for the hills. After all we're still alive and kicking despite the odds." Rocket glances at her and for once considers what his saying before opening his mouth. "Don't jinx it Nidnene. Fate is not set to favour the little guy by default and the good guys rarely win."

"Go get us some coffee or whatever and stop dampening my mood you eternal bringer of jollity." Nidnene sighs half jokingly and pushes Rocket to move towards the coffee table queue.

* * *

 

Rocket is standing atop the bar counter surveying the crowd with a coffee cup in one hand and his helmet tucked under the other arm. Though there are new faces in the crowd, they are way too few to his liking and way too many of those new faces are clearly those whom the Badoon hadn't even cared to round-up just yet, the sick, the elderly, too young or otherwise handicapped ones... People who couldn't put up a fight even if they wanted to. It was a testament for the Badoon efficiency and strategy that in a city of 100 000 Rocket's motley team of freedom fighters had managed to reach less than 500 during these four days of siege and soon these five hundred would begin to run out on food. Providing enough clean water was already becoming a problem since the city water and sewage treatment stations had been among the first to get hit. _Better get this show on the road or we're all going to die on dysentery_. Rocket muses morosely, setting his cup down on the counter, before 'kicking' online the makeshift holo-projector he'd workshopped together during the day.

To Rocket the contraption was crude and rudimentary, mainly made up from the insides of a fire extinguisher, aquarium water pump, garden shower head, a couple of halogen lights and bits of glass and wiring, all attached to his wrist communicator via power cord for controls and computing power. He had clearly underestimated the usual level of technology among his audience if their slack jawed looks were any kind of indicator when the first projection came to life.

"Ahem! May I have your attention, please." Rocket starts, feeling slightly nervous when all eyes in the room fixate on him. He straightens himself up needlessly before continuing. "I'm sure you've all heard the rumors by now, about dead not staying dead... Now this is at least partially true -BUT we're still investigating on this to find out if it's some kind of illness brought in by the invaders or something else and as a precaution, nobody touches anyone that looks like a cadaver. Just leave the bodies where they are and move on. You can't do anything for them anyway." Rocket adds when the crowd begins to get restless.

"As an actual today's agenda, I've promised a sit-rep on what's going on and I won't lie. It's not looking good right now, also as our supplies are dwindling and some of us here are actually quite ill or badly injured. Thus we've been working on plans for evacuation of civilians and gathering more supplies to continue our efforts in ousting the invaders..." He continues, projecting images and sketches with his contraption while speaking for the next twenty minutes to his audience who are staring at the presentation in almost stunned silence. Many of them just now realizing how bad their situation really was.

"...And to conclude this briefing, let's give applauds to sneakiest of lads; Tan Two-hills, who took quite the risk in nicking those service tunnel blueprints from the city hall right from under the Badoon noses. Without his efforts our evacuation plans wouldn't have been possible." Rocket announces indicating at the steel grey furred lad sitting by a corner table with his friends. The youngling in question seems slightly confused by the sudden attention his receiving while the crowd raucously cheers for their latest hero.

* * *

 

"Most of the supplies left have been repacked and distributed Guardian-Ranger. The lookouts report nothing unusual in the tunnels." Roork informs snappily to Rocket whose sitting on a small stool next to his injured kit Trey at the basement. Rocket glances up when spoken to and puts away the small metal casing his been fondling. The casing seamlessly reattaches to the left pelvic side of his armour. "Good work Roork, Tell Ash to carry on with the evacuation as planned." Rocket replies absently.

"What about you sir? Aren't you coming with us?" Roork questions sensing that something is in the 'air'. Which prompts Rocket to actually look up and respond sharply. "Soldier doesn't question, Roork." The former Baker's apprentice eyes his leader shiftily before rescinding any protests he may have harboured with a quiet nod of acquiescence. Rocket watches him leave with a small frown before turning his attention back to his son still sleeping lightly. Nidnene had managed to lure Uno & Duo out and moving from the basement by bribing them with promises of pancakes. The doc had assured that their timidness was temporary and that the kits would recover -assuming things wouldn't escalate much worse than what they were now, and speaking of the devil... Rocket eyed Doctor Greyle walking in to check on his small patient. It wasn't that Rocket didn't trust the old and grey whiskered physician in particular but he could never make himself fully trust any medical professional, no matter how benign or harmless.

"So how's little Trey?" The doc asks calmly ignoring Rocket's glare.

"Sleepy, like his been since yesterday." Rocket sighs holding his son's small paw at his own before the doc grasps it.

"So, still no change? What was in that drug you gave your son Mr. Rocket? I worry it may have been too potent if there's no change in activity soon." Doc muses setting Trey's arm back down once he has noted his pulse from the wrist.

"Kree combat steroids... I don't know everything that's in them but they're designed to increase blood cell count, stimulate natural immune response and healing, to work as analgesic and to generally stimulate. You're supposed to make your own cocktail from the vials according to situation and preference." Rocket explains showing the vial casing for the Doc.

"I see, and you used your _premade_ -mix?" The doc guesses reading into Rockets guilty look.

"I didn't know what else to do... He, -he was so pale and would have probably died otherwise." Rocket sighs in regret. "No, no. I think you've made the right call during his field dressing. He very well might have died if you hadn't given him the drug. In any case, if you please Mr Rocket. I'd like to check on his artery shunt, splints and bandages now." The doc assures lifting the covers on Trey to look at his right thigh where the temporary shunt was inserted to bypass the damaged main artery.

"Field dressing -bah. Want to know what that means among mercs out there beyond the great black?" Rocket grumbles dismissively while making circling hand gestures above his head. "I'll tell you; you'd have taken a plasma sabre and just cut the lad's legs off and later made him cybernetic prosthetics or vat grown a new pair instead of making him suffer like this. But me... I had no guts to do what should've been done."

Doc. Greyle blinks at this a little, nervously adjusting his horn rimmed glasses. "Well, that's certainly... Efficient, I guess. Harsh but efficient though I'm confident that his legs will heal fine given time and proper treatment and I'm positive there will be no need for any -such radical procedures." He finally notes in dry fashion, getting up from a crouch at the floor by Trey's pallet.

"Fraking quack, that man. I tell you." Rocket grumbles to no one in particular once the doc has gone away.

And Trey suddenly pipes up, now fully awake and beaming with child-like imagination. "I could have robo-legs, so cool... I'd be a super star-soldier just like you daddy."

"Well, ahh, -It's not all it's cracked up to be, kiddo." Rocket chuckles after a short moment of perplexing on how to respond. He carefully wraps his son on a blanket and lifts him up to carry in his arms. "you feel like eating yet?" He asks walking upstairs. They'd need to get moving soon anyway and it would be best if he could get Trey to eat first. The kit hadn't eaten anything in at least a day, -lack of appetite was a known side-effect of the steroids.

"Daddy?"

"Yes, son?"

"what's a Fraking?"

" I - ahh, I'll explain, when you're a little older, okay?" Rocket mutters flustered and hoping that Nidnene would never find out from whom Trey had learned that word.

* * *

 

"Eyy, daddy! Your pancakes are better than mommy's! She makes them weird." Uno & Duo yell in choir when Rocket arrives to the kitchen with Trey and carefully sets him down on a kitchen chair.

Nindene grumbles something inaudible at Rocket's questioning look when he notices something which looks like the remains of a spongy cake in a pan at the sink. At least it wasn't burned, Nidnene was way too good chef to make a mistake like that, but it still wasn't a 'pancake'. Rocket surmised to himself. She follows Rockets gaze on the sink. "Well, I've never made them before but the kits say they liked them just the same as yours." She snaps at him defensively.

"Let me try and show you how they're made and we can all eat some 'real' pancakes, okay?" He suggests pleadingly when his SO starts to show signs of anger for the feeling of her cookery skills being ridiculed.

Rocket has barely managed to get the batter ready and simmering when Ashen busts into the kitchen. "Guardian-Ranger, you've got to see this quick!" He whisper-yells at him, frantically waving with his right hand while holding the Badoon assault plasma war riffle at his left which immediately clued Rocket that something was very wrong. He had strictly forbidden any kind of gun waving inside the house days ago for the reasons of basic gun safety.

"Go find Roork and tell him to get everyone into the tunnels Nidnene. I'll be back soon." He tells her and rushes after Ashen leaving confused Nidnene to wonder which would be more pressing to her; to make sure her kit was getting something to eat or go alert Roork. After a brief inner battle she plops the utensils and slightly raw pancake in front of Trey, tells the kits to behave and goes to find him.

 "That's an attack formation Delta if I've ever seen one." Rocket mumbles to Ashen whose huddling beside him behind the roof ridge of the Inn, using a makeshift trench periscope to spy the Badoon troops three stories below, to avoid being spotted by the enemy that was edging in and around the city block containing the building complex which housed the Inn.

"Fight or Flight?" Ash questions sounding almost surprisingly calm.

"Flight, there's no point in getting overrun and slaughtered. There's a time and a place for last stand and this isn't it." Rocket determines as stoic as ever. "I had hoped for us to be gone before dawn but the Badoon have stepped it up for some reason. They hate the night-time, you know -them being lizard-like and all is more deeply ingrained than just the visage." He adds noticing Ashen's unvoiced question.

"What if we have a turncoat among us? I mean someone must have tipped them off." Ash frowns worried.

"Nah, not in our own ranks. If they were sure of our whereabouts they'd have charged right in or blown this block to smithereens with orbital bombardment already. Lucky for us those thick clouds are blocking that option right now... Come on, it's high time to get everyone moving." Rocket whispers and Ashen gets on his knees at the roof ladder, rising his head just above the ridge to crawl past Rocket to get back in through the roof hatch when it happens. There's no warning, just a hiss of superheated air and a flash of light drawing after-images on Rocket's artificial retinas through the periscope. Rocket turns his head to warn his mate just to see his frozen look of confusion before he tumbles down along the steep roof. There's still no other sound but the hollow thud and polymeric clatter from his gun and body hitting the ground below. Rocket lets out a string of curses that would literally make a Shi'ar space pirate blush and a veteran Ravager to sweat, feeling the next shot bounce off from the back of his armour, while already diving through the hatch.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dear readers, you may have noticed that I'm dropping the 'accent'. As much I enjoyed it, it was getting too hard for me to keep it consistent and at this point it doesn't really serve a narrative purpose as everyone in the setting speak with a similar accent, thanks to Rocket's translator implant and the peculiarities of Raccoonoid larynx.


	6. Chapter 6

Ch 6

 

Nidnene has barely returned to kitchen in time to stop the brewing food fight between Uno & Duo over the last pancake, having already taken Trey into tunnels with the other 'slow' people, when she hears a thud just outside the window. She peeks into the night beyond the small kitchen window, grabs her trusty shotgun without saying a word and seeing nothing she thinks, _My mind must be playing tricks_ turning her attention back to her kits. "C'mon kits, time to get moving." She says and freezes for a second upon seeing what's lurking and scraping behind the window. Ashen, or rather something which looked like Ashen but she was pretty damn sure it wasn't -couldn't be him when she pulled the trigger to shoot at 'it' through the glass, taking the creatures head clean off with her gun.

"Maker's mercy in all heavens." She mutters over and over in an attempt to get a grip of herself until the whine of her frightened kits pulls her back on track. She quickly reloads the sawed-off shot gun, almost surprised at how little her hands shake, and grabs the kits in to her embrace before running out of the kitchen, nearly colliding with Rocket at the doorway, who was running towards the gun shots with several able bodied men in tow.

"What happened, Nidnene? Who did you shoot at?" Rocket asks sounding  almost annoyingly calm. Nidnene eyes at him in askance. "It looked like Ash but it sure wasn't him -not anymore."

"Flark me! This is just Krutacking frackin' fann-tastic! Like we need another problem on top of those damn lizards about to storm the Inn!" Rocket spits angry from both the loss of Ashen and the realization that from now on they'd need to kill twice anyone recently deceased.

"Excuse me, mister!" Nidnene retorts in dangerous tone, holding her hands at her hips. Reminding Rocket about the age of some of his audience.

Rocket is gathering a reply to her but changes what his about to say into confused "what the flark was that?"-look on his face when they all can hear heavy thuds and loud shouting in strange hissing language from behind the heavily blocked main door. The group looks at their each others before replying in unison "The Badoon." Rocket almost throws her out of the way in to safety behind the partition wall. She hears wood breaking and they start firing. Suddenly the whole building shakes and everything seems to go into slow motion. Rocket screams something which Nidnene can't make out. Thick clouds of dust and plaster rains down on them, suffocating and obfuscating everything. People are screaming, running, shooting happens somewhere else in the building too, but mostly its towards the main doors at the long wall of the saloon she realizes. Rocket again yells something unintelligible while she tries to drag her transfixed kits towards safety, to basement. She glances at her beautiful, brave husband drawing something out from his belt pocket, something which looks like a grenade. His about to throw it towards the Saloon and she feels a surge of pride for him. She can clearly hear the roof timbers creak in alarm, Rocket yells and abruptly there's a roaring bright flash. She instinctively jumps on top of her kits to shield them from it all and everything goes dark around her.

* * *

 

His about to reply her about his use of language! in front of their kits when they hear the shouting and banging from behind the barricaded front doors. The Badoon! They all curse in unison and Rocket turns around cocking the Badoon made infantry riffle before shoving Nidnene roughly behind the corner and out of their firing line. The front doors burst in and Rocket orders the troops to commence firing. The momentum of the attack shifts and even halts momentarily as the Badoon bodies pile up at the door. Abruptly the whole building begins to shake.

"Aah- Flark! The Badoon captain must have ordered the Monsters of Badoon to break through the walls. Take cover people!" Rocket yells and flips his helmet visor down to shield him from the dust and particles raining down on them and grabs a grenade, readying to throw it, when the roof beams creak alarmingly which makes him look up and shout a warning. It's just enough of a distraction for their firing to slow which offers a Badoon trooper the chance to slug in his own grenade. The explosion roars through the saloon, bashing Rocket and his men against and even through the partition walls when they're not immediately ripped apart by the blast. Rocket is saved from immediate death by the grace of his armor. He shakily tries to get up and fight but the roof beams can no longer stand the abuse and with a heavy groan the ceiling falls on top of him.

* * *

 

She slowly comes back to her senses when someone grabs her by the wrists to hoist her up from the rubble and they sure as heck aren't spindly and hairy but big, muscular and quite scaly hands. Groping and checking on her to see if she's irrevocably 'damaged goods' or not. She screams in fright at the realization but all that comes out is a rasping cough and her head spins making her feel queasy. The alien lets out a nasty sounding chuckle while saying something in that raspy hissing language of theirs and claps a pair of odd looking shackles on her wrists. She's not given further time to explore her new 'jewelry' or what's going on around her by her captors when she is quickly escorted out of the ruined building with a handful of other survivors.

"Where are my kits! Maker's mercy my kits!" She realizes, crying out frantically and tries to turn around and run back in to the house but is roughly pushed back in line with the other prisoners though the lizard-man in charge gives her the strangest of looks as if understanding what she just said and grunts something to another lizard-man. His subordinate looks like his about to balk at the orders but quickly decides otherwise and scuttles back in. He soon returns with Nidnene's futilely resisting kits in his grasp and unceremoniously dumps them on her and the prisoner caravan trudges forward as soon as she's gathered her kits to cling from the hem of her skirts. She turns to thank the Badoon commander for letting her keep her kits with her but realizes from the way he looks at them that it hadn't been altruism that saved her kits but plain old greed. Child slaves were worth more than adults.

She glances behind her past the guard to get that one last look on the life she once led and for the longest time after, her wish is that she'd never had. The building was slowly catching flames and the saloon had been completely destroyed. Out of the corner of her eyes she glimpses the faith of those picked from the house who were too injured or infirm to walk on their own. The Badoon line them up against the wall to execute them and one by one the dead rise up which the Badoon then round up to herd them like cattle into a different direction. The only small solace is that she can't make out their faces. The guard grunts and prods her with his weapon, goading her to move faster and she numbly complies. What else was there to do but to obey? She had lost her first mate to disease and second to this war but she still had two kits to care for and at that moment it was all that really mattered to her and she was willing to go through a great deal to accomplish it. _Care the living first --mourning for the dead now would help no one._

* * *

 

_Have to get... Up. Fight, fight, fight! Fight it you miserable piece of flark! They're all going to die if I don't. You can't let those bastards win..._ Rocket curses his weakness, struggling to keep conscious after the blast that had thrown him against the wall with enough force to kill almost anyone without a fuso-carbon and titanium enhanced skeleton and advanced combat armor. He climbs back to his feet and tries to shake off the blackness & splotches of colors swimming through his vision. He hears a timber groan above him and something heavy falls over him, knocking him out cold for good.

It's completely dark. The suit's lights weren't responding to commands -probably broken if the big crack in his helmet's visor is any indicator and something heavy lays over him, pressing his chest and making breathing hard. _The ceiling has collapsed._ Rocket realizes. His eyelids droop heavily but he slowly claws himself back to consciousness and carefully tries to move but his unable to wriggle even an inch. The incessant beeping is getting louder -the oxygen level of the suit is low and soon it will run out and being hermetic it means he'll inexorably suffocate. Normally the suit's reserves automatically replenished when enough oxygen was present in the surrounding atmosphere. Probably clogged from dust or the recent fire had left too much carbon monoxide in the air. The suit lets out a second, longer sequence of beeps. Two minutes left before oxygen was too low to remain conscious. After that he would have another minute or two depending on how much he had inside his own lungs. Probably not the worst way to go but it still sucked hairy Gorgonite glonards -all twelve of them. If he only could reach his knife he might have a chance to cut himself free. The suit chimes a third set of beeps, -oxygen level critical. he gives up on trying to reach the knife with his fingertips and admits to himself that; yes life indeed mostly sucks and then you die.

* * *

 

"Is he... dead, Doc?" Roork whispers kneeling down beside doc Greyle at the basement. Boss hadn't been moving when found and Roork hadn't even been sure if he was still alive when they'd dragged him out from under the rubble once the Badoon had left.

"I don't know yet, Roork! Help me get this damn helmet off and I'll consider telling you" Doctor Greyle snaps nervously while trying to figure out how to remove the helmet without breaking it.

"Wait, look there's a latch right there..." Tan points out.

"Wait! don't just..." Roork hisses but his too late to stop the kid and the helmet seal loosens with an audible hiss.

"... go touching on what you don't know." He finishes grumpily.

"Well, his alive but definitely not looking good. Make a stretcher. It may actually be for the best that he isn't conscious right now. He'll move less that way." Greyle says but doesn't look terribly hopeful.

"All right people, you heard the man! Make a stretcher and Let's move out." Roork orders sounding quite a bit more confident than what he actually felt. In truth he had barely any plans aside from leading them out of the city via service tunnels. After that there was very little hope for keeping these people together and fighting the invasion with Ashen gone and if Guardian-Ranger wouldn't recover. Guardian-Ranger may have taken a shine on him but Roork knew what he really was -just a baker's apprentice playing at being a soldier. There was no way anyone would ever follow his lead if they had another choice. Behind him the people form up to a line in dour silence before following Roork into darkness. Trusting him with their lives to guide them to safety.

* * *

 

As far as Greyle knew Rocket should've died in the blast and even though he had survived the blast his innards might still be completely scrambled. Greyle's inner monologue ends abruptly when the line suddenly stops. A domino effect of bumping and cursing goes through the line, making him almost hit his muzzle on the back of the guy in front of him when the person behind him bumps against his back.

"What is it, why did we stop?" Someone frantically stage-whispers from the middle of the row. "There's something ahead of us..." Another voice replies from farther ahead.  "Be quiet you idiots!" A third voice whispers frantically. The Doc tenses his grip around the handle of one of the Guardian-ranger's futuristic pistols. He wouldn't mind him borrowing them when it meant keeping him safe.

Suddenly a beam of bright light floods over the long column of survivors. There's a moment of confusion in the cramped up space as everyone tries to grab and point their guns, batons and assorted homemade shiv's & Billy clubs at the light up ahead.

"Wait a minute! Stand down everyone! You're no Lizards!" Roork yells at someone.

"Well neither are you, I reckon." Someone shouts back and after some shuffling to get to the front of the line the Doc can see that Roork is standing a few feet apart from both groups, chatting animatedly with another Raccoonoid whose most assuredly wearing military gear and displays special forces group leader insignias on his lapel.

"Well, it's about damn time you guys showed up." Is all that he bothers to reply in greeting for being 'saved' which makes his savior slightly crestfallen.

* * *

 

Rocket wasn't pleased with this development. Well, he was obviously pleased to be alive but he was not pleased to have found himself akin to a prisoner and wearing a hospital gown while being incarcerated in some ruddy, probably underground bunker, and being questioned like a common criminal by this woman, who during their first interview had introduced herself as Special agent Samase Brightwater. She was once again sitting across the table in front of him, readying to interview him though in Rocket's mind it was closer to interrogation.

“Now what the frakk is all this crap for? Why do you keep asking these stupid questions! You already said that you agree that I would be the best to have as your middle man for talks with the wider Galaxy!” Rocket grumbled throwing the electric pen on the table and refusing to go through the questions displayed at a pad placed on the table for him when she entered the room.

“That is not the issue here Galactic guardian Rocket Raccoon.” She announced stressing Rockets 'job title' and Rocket was sure there was a slight mocking undertone in that voice. Was she amused by his name, him or his group, their alleged intentions or perhaps all four?

“Then what the frakk are these psychic evaluations for? And don’t say they’re not, I recognize a psychic evaluation when I see one.”

 “We’re trying to determine how dangerous your existence is to public safety and whether you are fit to be released among the populace without a chaperone once we have the situation back under control.” Samase replies almost annoyingly pleasant like.

“Oh, okay. Sure.” Rocket contends. He supposed that he was dangerous in his own way, especially when annoyed to his limit and he provably tended to carry enough fire power to blow up a small moon on a regular basis but he’d still never before been forced to go through a psychic evaluation by the planet's authority before being allowed to save the planet in question. Either these people had never before met a Raccoon-in-space. Quite likely possible as there was only one of him, or something else was going on and they were stalling for some reason. It wasn’t like he couldn’t just rig open the flimsy lock in the door of this room he’d been awoken at -Still without really seeing anyone else except this woman, just taking and leaving might rob him from possible allies. He picked up the pen and pad from the table once again and started filling out the questions as requested, knowing that lying wasn’t really going to be an option and too many ambiguous answers might be seen as a sign of mistrust or an attempt at deceit from his part. So he grit his teeth, placing the finished questionnaire tablet on the table and waited for the woman to return.

* * *

 

"Well what do you think, is-is it - _real_?" Samase asks trying to hide her nervousness from her comrades.

"All tests say yes, it's real and not an android skin-job or some other kind of mechanical puppet sent down to infiltrate us by the enemy. Though there are some strange things about it when you look at the deep scans we took earlier." Doctor Kevorken Miles replies confidently.

"Look people, could we please use the word _he,_ It gives me the willies to look at him while you refer him as _it_ as if he'd have less value than a mere pet." Commander Ravn Nightshade voices his displeasure.

"Yes, the uncanny valley effect... while _it_ -he looks fairly annoyed and bored right now we can't be sure how autonomous _it_ is. However I don't think _it_ intends to be harmful to us or our home and the answers in the questionnaire that we've received from this... Rocket indicate as much." She says.

"What about those others... he mentioned about." Ravn said and shivered slightly when thinking about the revolting looking near hairless lizard aliens that had invaded their planet not even a week ago.

"Yes, most unsettling." she says rather ambiguously.

"So all agree on the mental assessment summary?" Kevorken pipes up, wanting to get the meeting back on track.

"Yes, to summarize; highly intelligent and dangerous if provoked but otherwise stable and mostly harmless despite some indications of unspecified recalcitrance towards regulations & authority and minor mental health problems possibly due to combat related PSTD." She replies looking at her notes.

"Aye, I concur those findings. He does seems like a veteran of some kind." Ravn agrees.

"All right then next item; items carried. Allowed to keep them, aye or nay?" She says.

"Nay, can't let them get in to wrong hands and our weapon R&D dept. could really use an edge. Any edge." Doctor Kevorken notes with a certain gleam in his eyes.

"I say Aye. We should show some trust in our part as well. He has already shown considerable patience by letting us poke and prod him." Ravn counters.

"well that assumes _it's_ not considered as expendable." she reminds her colleagues and continues. "I say aye as well, let _it_ keep its possessions and weaponry but inform _it_ that they must be kept deactivated and out of public sight during its stay here on the pain of imprisonment and banishment."

"Estimated risk level in one to ten? I say eight due to possibility of negative feedback from interacting with general populace he isn't already acquainted with." She notes scribbling something on the page paragraph.

"Six, he probably will comply with the rules once they're made clear but it might be best to limit his interactions at first." Ravn says.

"Eight, I doubt _it_ will heed them very vigorously as I have noted in my quick & dirty psychic analysis." Doctor  comments.

"Very well... Seven it is then. We'll let i _t_ roam free with the stipulations mentioned while under covert surveillance in case of problems. Aye?" Samase summarizes.

"Aye -and you two, stop calling him _it_ already." Ravn huffs.

"Aye - and aye, I could positively make a case study out of you and your sudden enthusiastic compassion towards this _extraterrestrial_ procyonian, Commander Nightshade"

"Don't you even dare poking _my_ brains Doc." Ravn replies sharply.

"Enough! We have to get these reports presentable and done for our dear Chairman Lyoko Talltree of the intelligence committee AKA our actual boss, in three hours." She reminds them snappily which quite pleasantly shuts up the unprofessional banter.

* * *

 

"...And then we have Mr. Rocket Raccoon, the apparent defacto leader of the 'resistance cell' of city district 16. Whom I will now quote from transcription as the video capture from his preliminary interrogation did not contain a mic." She explains flipping over her notes. "I refuse to co-operate with any such fascist pigs like YOU." and I quote again here "-And I swear to you, once I break out of this flarking chokey, I'll slather you Flarknards with Gunavian jelly and skullfuck you into your empty eye sockets while you're still alive and in great pain unless you release me right flarking now and reveal the whereabouts and/or fate of my mate, people and kits." Special agent Samase Brightwater finishes with a small sigh, deciding to leave out the rest of the rather vulgar but colorful & innovative descriptions of violence and sexual anatomy and his very threatening demeanor and body language which was evident in the film anyway.

"So he is dangerous, unpredictable, mostly uncontrollable and therefore probably not someone we should let loose?" The chairman said after a fashion.

"Well yes, a very dangerous individual but not to us. I think. Well beyond his umm, rather colorful threats but he did turn more amenable once his initial anger and shock had faded." She corrects.

"Alright. What do we have gathered so far about him and 'his people' as he calls them." He says encouraging her to continue with her report.

"We gathered 387 civilians and 63 militiamen total from the service tunnels after the scouting parties had made the initial contact with their group. Their leader and near half of their fighting men had received  severe concussions, energy weapon wounds and numerous minor lacerations from the battle fought against the invaders and he himself was still unconscious when found. His second; a man called Roork Shade water, claims that they initially were around five hundred strong and were in the process of evacuating to a more secure premises when they were attacked by the enemy which are now known as a starfaring civilization called the Badoon Empire. You will find the detailed report in the blue folder." She says indicating at the blue plastic folder in a stack of dozens of military and intelligence reports that littered his desk in haphazard piles.

"I'll look into it later. Thank you." He thanks curtly to which she just nods before continuing.

"During medical procedures done to mister Raccoon and once we had removed his rather intriguingly sophisticated suit of armor... We discovered that he has had a set of very extensive and unbelievably advanced bionic modifications done to him. Though I find the word distasteful to use I find no other word that properly describes his implantations short of calling them cybernetic. Pardon the use of a word of fiction." She apologizes almost timidly. His boss nods in acceptance. He knew how much she detested the use of 'fantastical' words in her reports, deeming them as unprofessional.

"So his 'cybernetics', -was there something especially 'special' about them that they needed this much attention in reports?"

"Well, they seem to follow function and by the reports from eyewitnesses, they work very well in their function. He appears to be some kind of 'living weapon' or perhaps a 'super soldier'? But on whose side and under whose orders, I cannot determine. X-ray charts, sketches and photos of his implantation can be found at the end of my team's assessment of the threats posed by the Badoon invasion. He personally claims to be a member of 'The Guardians of the Galaxy'. Ridiculous title, I know, but it's what he insists on." She concludes.

"Well he certainly isn't siding with those Badoon scum, considering how earnest they wanted to kill him and his group." He notes rubbing his chin in thought. "Was there anything else I should pay special attention to?"

"No sir, apart from the curious note from the research team that there's something not quite right with his DNA."

The chairman just glances at her, encouraging her to keep going with the briefing.

"It appears that while he looks exactly like us and by his own admission can even reproduce successfully with our species, his DNA reveals that he most assuredly isn't like us, not really."

"In what capacity is he different from us? His kit seemed fairly normal to my eyes." Chairman Talltree comments somewhat sceptically.

"I'm not a geneticists but those who are say that his DNA seemed very purposefully altered - almost over engineered in comparison to our own. You know, leaner and meaner as the saying goes and much of this 'package' has likely been carried to his offspring." She elaborates further.

"Does this pose a danger to public safety or health at large?"

"According to our experts; assuming that his current and possible future offspring are carefully monitored and not allowed to further breed into population, the risk of genetic contamination should remain minimal."

"Alright, good work Agent Brightwater and in the meantime, you're to work as a liaison to this 'Galaxy guardian' and his surviving group. If he really has the means to help us fight back these invaders, then by all means offer all the aid you can muster with my blessing. We've already lost a sizable city, 1700 war machines, thousands of airplanes and another several thousand men and countless civilians in this 'war' without even a dent on our enemy. By this rate we'll lose the whole continent in less than a month. By the latest reports their numbers just keep growing with something which our soldiers have recently started calling as 'Zoms & Monsters' after the slang used by those 'militia men' we detained at City district-13." Chairman Talltree comments flipping through the files that were at the top of the pile in front of him.

"Yes sir. I'll do my best." Samase acknowledges saluting briskly and snaps her heels together before leaving his office.

 


	7. Chapter 7

Ch 7

 

Rokuten Aerie was an ancient military instalment, a very ancient one. in fact it was estimated to be one of the first that had been built on the planet and positively oldest still in use. Though it had been in existence since the days immemorial and had served the last hundred years as a preserved historic monument, it had still remained partially in its original use and seen constant upgrades. Built as layers upon layers, mined inside a table mountain overlooking the main pass to the valley plain which located the besieged city of Rokuten, it also was almost ideally located to house their campaign HQ.

Still, Rocket had no trouble seeing the flaws in its archaic design and almost naive belief the original builders had had for the imperviousness of hard rock to protect them against any assault. He knew better. The stone floor felt cold even through the soles of the shoes they'd given him along with the rather old fashioned collared white shirt and black trousers. They had yet to return his suit and other stuff and Rocket had a fairly good idea about the reason for the delay.

"So what kind of self-defence systems are in place here, please don't tell me there's none at hand?" Rocket asks interrupting his tour guide monologuing about the all-important historical facets of the instalment which Rocket couldn't have cared less.

"Well, umm. I'm sure we have enough forces stationed here to man all stations. I mean it's not likely for those aliens to scale up the walls or anything like that and we have planes and bazookas if they try it from the air." His guide, Junior Officer Underhill, a rather young looking lad explains in earnest. making Rocket sigh in annoyance. He'd already nicknamed the youngling as 'Junior' after his military title and at the moment t felt quite apt.

"If you say so. -Just lead me to my son's room and have us arranged to be staying together while you're at it."

"Certainly, sir. I'll pass on the request. Right this way." The young officer replies taking a sharp turn to the left at the next corner in the maze of corridors while Rocket did his best to memorize it all.

* * *

 Rocket noted to his satisfaction that the room the military types had given to Trey was larger and much less austere than his. Of course it was still windowless and had that big and heavy half domed metal door with a sliding view slit like all the personnel rooms at the keep but it was still notably personalized and comfy. If not by much except in the way of some creature comforts such as a thick but rather worn out rug carpet, fairly nice looking pipe framed metal bed with thick blanket and mattress, stool and table and some other little things that made it look more like a guest room than a cell.

The only reason his son isn't jumping straight up and rushing to hug him is the fact that his both legs are in casts which doesn't stop the kit from using his wheel chair to get into hugging distance as soon as the door is opened. Rocket bends down to hug his son in earnest while fighting back tears of joy and sadness. Big men don't cry after all and he surely wasn't about to start now.

"Well? You can bugger of now, pal." Rocket grunts to his escort while surreptitiously wiping moisture from his eyes on the back of his arm. The man hesitates but momentarily before leaving and closing the door behind him to give them some much needed privacy.

"so, how have you been treated son? Been all right?" He asks ruffling his son's guard hairs between the ears.

"They've been nice. Gotten a lot of ice cream and then when fever went away and then they took me to this place with a big shiny light and... it hurt lots when I was put on a table but then this one doctor gives something and puts a mask over my face and it didn't hurt so much and I got all sleepy, and then I woke up and my legs were in this hard-thing and the nice lady, who promises to give me more ice-cream for being so good, says it's called 'cast' and that I'm not supposed to scratch my legs even when it itches real bad." Trey starts animatedly.

"I know son, it can sometimes hurt a lot before you get better." Rocket agrees recalling some of his own much less gentle medical procedures.

"Want to see my drawings, daddy?" Trey asks suddenly and is already pulling away and wheedling towards the desk where several crude child's drawings were scattered about. "Oh, sure thing." Rocket says feeling a bit uncertain of how to react. What he recalled he had never been asked to judge someone's drawings let alone child's.  Come to think of it he'd never been allowed to draw freely either when he was young.

"Oh, it's very nice... I -ahh like the -broom? a lot." He tries, making his best to understand and appreciate what was depicted in the crude crayon drawings. "That's you and that's your gun daddy and that's the meanie lizards blowing up." Trey explains pouting a little and pointing at the 'broom' that was held by a weird looking lumpy thing drawn in blue that was pointing "the broom" at leaner and more elongated weirdly bloated figures that were drawn in green and criss-crossed with spiky yellow lines in star pattern.

"Okay,  so what about mommy and your brothers, did you draw them as well?" Rocket points out, quickly changing the subject as even he with his limited understanding of children was pretty sure that kits drawing their parents killing Badoon probably wasn't a healthy sign and it was making him uncomfortable for some reason.

"yah, here." Trey suddenly sniffs and hands the drawings to his father from under the pile almost without looking. Making Rocket frown in worry about what he might see and is relieved to find something fairly normal looking instead of something akin to mutilated bodies or... Well, okay it's a stick figure, Rocket suspected it to depict Ashen, stalking... Stalking behind the window? It hit him then. Oh man, his kit was going have as fucked up upbringing as his father's by this rate. Trey's next question however gets Rocket totally off the thought track he was on.

"Daddy? when we're going to see mommy again? I want to go home."

"We-, I mean,-I, ahh, I don't know son. Hopefully soon." Was all he could think to say. It was probably pointless to explain to a child as young as Trey that his mommy and brothers were possibly dead by now. Hell, he hadn't fully processed it even himself yet.

"Yeah, I miss mommy too." Trey sighs giving his father a hug he didn't even know he needed.

"Say, how'd you like to have a little walk with me around the base Trey and maybe get to see a bit of view?" Rocket suggests figuring it to be a decent distraction for Trey to get his mind of from his mom.

"Hey you! Get over here." Rocket whistles poking his head out of the door way to get his 'chaperon's' attention. The Young officer is leaning idly against the wall but snaps himself up to attention to look at Rocket in alarm, nearly dropping the paper he had been reading to kill the time. "You're going to take us for a tour, got it?" Rocket announces pushing the door fully open and starts to cart out Trey sitting at his wheel chair. The poor kit had both legs in cast which made walking in any form a pretty big no, no way, no el happeno.

* * *

 

The final part of the 'tour' brought Rocket and his son to the flight deck & hangars at the upper two-thirds part of the Mesa (by Rocket's own estimation.) The slightly dusty hangar area was clearly a very late addition to the fortress and hosted maybe five to six archaic jet airplanes, probably 10 at most and of those present full half were clearly civilian and it was here that the thing which had been bothering Rocket for awhile came to light. -Procyon-6 barely had an army! Or rather a one that could be called as such. It was in fact pretty obvious why. Without external threats a unified planet would have very little need for trained soldiers when conscripts and police would be perfectly good to handle any civil unrest or emergency.

The great curved riveted-steel blast doors were closed now but Rocket spotted a 'doggy door' at the far side.

"Come on son, let's get some fresh air shall we?" He announced with a fake cheer and started towards the door.

"But, but you can't go there, sir! It's off the limits." The young officer shrieks almost frantically in protest and tries to grab Rocket's arm.

"Bite me, jar-head." Rocket sneers in response, starting to wheel Trey at a trot-pace across the landing strip while shooing off the officer, running after them, which made Trey giggle.

 

Outside the beautiful sunset panorama was slowly turning to night. Unfortunately their view was marred by the ravaged city beyond the valley, still smouldering and glowing against the increasing gloom in parts and even from this far it was obvious that the Badoon now held complete control over the city. It was also obvious that the meager and outgunned military of the Planet would have no chance of regaining it. At the distance, against the backdrop of darkening sky Rocket could make out the tiny slivers of light reflecting from the three mile long Badoon mother ship orbiting somewhere high and far above the planet and also way beyond the reach of anything the Procyonians could throw at it.

"It's a nice sunset isn't it, Trey." He finally says feeling the somber quiet having lasted long enough.

"Will mommy and my baby bros be all right? The kit asks yawning slightly. It had been a long day for a kit as young as he.

"Your mom's a tough cookie, son. She'll make it and is keeping your brothers safe. We'll just have to wait a bit, I'm sure..." Rocket sighs hugging at his son in the cold night breeze. "Promise?" the kit whispers and Rocket suddenly finds it impossible to hold back a tear and not just because his spinal implants decided to painfully remind him of their presence but from a set of emotions he wasn't used to handling.

"Don't cry, daddy. Mommy will be back." The kit assures with all his youthful trust placed in to believing that adults would make things to be better eventually.

"I know son, I know. It's just something I got into my eyes" He assures Trey, slowly swinging him at the crook of his arms as if he were still a newly weaned kit. the kits eyelids slowly droop and once he falls asleep, Rocket returns him back to wheel chair and pulls a blanket over him and very carefully stretches until the barely audible click signals the slightly displaced artificial spinal disc having slid back in place. Prompting Rocket to let out a relieved sigh.

"Don't say a word." He warns the officer who was having that weird look some people get when they see other people parenting but have no personal experience to relate to it.

* * *

At the evening Rocket had figured to spend some spare time with his son before late supper was served and to get the boy's mind of from his mother & brothers for awhile but instead of 'normal' things that kits of his age were excepted to talk about, Trey was pretty soon questioning about things which a kit of his age, in Rocket's opinion, shouldn't have any need to worry at all...

"But daddy if they have this really big ship to hold all of them in space, then why aren't they all here already?"

"Roche limit, son. That's the only hurdle to slow them right now. You can't dodge that limit." Rocket says, absently doodling something on a piece of paper.

"What's that?" Trey asks eyes squinting at the drawing, trying to remember if he'd ever heard of something like that.

"Well... ahh, okay. You know that all things have a mass and weight but they're not really the same thing, I'll explain that too some day. So about this mass... you following me so far. Right?"

The kit nods understanding at least some of it prompting Rocket to continue.

"Okay, bear with me, this gets a bit complicated. All these things that have a mass, including this planet we're in, pulls at one another like a magnet pulls at iron, if you will, it's actually a very weak force but its proportionate to mass of the objects so this planet pulls very much which is also why things drop down once you let go of them... That is commonly called gravity. A Roche limit is the closest that a huge but still smaller than this planet sized object can come at something as big as this planet without being ripped apart from being pulled into it and those Badoon mother ships are very, very big... But the real cache is that if the object is small enough -it can close-in safely. So they can only send smaller ships down and that makes it slower to send in all their troops. Now does that make any sense to your question son?" Rocket explains while further elaborating the points with the drawing he'd made.

"Wow daddy, You're so smart!-" Trey announces in wonder. The remainder of his sentence is cut by a set of sharp noises coming from outside the door. "Get behind me, son. NOW!" Rocket orders turning to face the door, brandishing the heavy wooden chair. He barely even registered ripping it apart to be used as improvised shield and Tonfa, positioning himself at the corner by the door, Trey clinging to the back of his waist for support. Rocket was pretty sure there were at least three maybe four persons behind the door. He waited as someone was rattling the latch and opened the door slowly before entering with his gun first.

The height at which the gun was held was an indication enough that the carrier was a raccoonoid. _How dare they! after all I've done for them already. How dare they threaten my only kit like this!_ Rocket fumed in his mind.

He immediately struck at the gun hand, forcing its carrier to drop the weapon and launched against him. Smashing his opponent against the wall, hard enough to wind him temporarily, giving Rocket enough time to grab the gun from the floor and jump back to avoid possible return fire from the enemy outside the room.

"Open wide and say AAARRGGH! Mother Krutacker" Rocket growls pointing the assault rifle at the face of the masked man on the floor. To his slight surprise the man on the floor immediately rises his hands up in surrender yelling in panic. "Don't shoot boss, please. Don't shoot, It's me Roork!"

Rocket stares at Roork, now ripping his ski mask off to reveal his face and then at the "three stooges" standing and shuffling uncertainly at the hallway with currently unconscious Junior lieutenant Underhill. "Well don't just stand there. Get in here you flarking idgets! And drag Junior in before someone else sees you." He growls almost shaking from rage at their stupidity. The three men nearly jump to obey. Rocket is too angry to pay attention on Trey slowly crawling under the bed to hide from all the angry adults.

"Give me those, you dolts! Now what the flark were you idgets thinking? or let me correct, you weren't thinking AT ALL. You're lucky you didn't kill that poor sod you dast idjets!" Rocket basically spits as he grabs the guns away and piles them on the table behind him while his men slowly take of their masks and stare at their feet in shame like school kids caught on cheating at tests. "Now is there anything you sorry sons of bitches would like to say to explain yourselves?"

"We- we thought you were held as a hostage and we're tired of waiting for something to happen." Roork finally courages enough to open his mouth.

"Well, I'm not... Now how many of you are involved in this mess? I might be able to-" Rocket sighs frustrated and is about to launch into another tirade about their perceived lack of character when his interrupted by heavy knocking from the door. "Open it!" Rocket whispers, quickly directing the three men to stand against the table to hide the guns piled on it while he shoves the unconscious officer in to the blind spot corner and throws a blanket over the form, knowing it wouldn't stand to anything but the most casual of glances. Agent Samase Brightwater and a full contingent of soldiers are lined up behind the door wearing full tacti-gear and by all appearances they're also ready to use them.

"I hope I'm not interrupting anything, Am I?" Samase inquires almost sickeningly sweet while peering at Rocket and the four men gathered about. "In a manner of speaking... Yes." Rocket admits, quickly realizing that the Flerken was already out of the bag.

"Yes' I'm sure you have a perfectly good explanation why those three nitwits by the table are trying to hide a pile of assault rifles behind their backs and Junior lieutenant Underhill has been hidden under the bedcovers by the corner... For your sake his better not be dead or seriously injured." She says sounding very close at hauling the whole lot to lockup in no time at all if Rocket's explanation wasn't satisfactory.

Rocket gropes at his face and his ears flatten forward, trying to think of what to respond. "They thought I was being held as a prisoner, can't really blame them for thinking that after the way you people restrained my contact with them... Anyway, I already told these four here that they're all idjets for trying to "rescue" me and luckily nobody's died yet. I don't think my other men have much to do with this other than just going with the group."

Samase scrutinizes Rocket before seemingly making a decision about something.

"I may regret this later but we really could use your expertise with one of our recent R&D projects... And it would be counter-productive to lockup all your men when we're already chronically understaffed -But! Regiment, take Junior lieutenant to infirmary and these four into brig, I'll question them later. Come see me in the morning and the sooner you have cleaned up this mess and returned those weapons back to the vault the better, Mr. Raccoon -and don't even dream of shirking from this meeting." She says sternly before Leaving Rocket alone with his son while escorting his men way into custody.

"Aww, flark! It's all going to shitter." Rocket grumbles taking a small metal flagon out from his pocket to have a good swill from it to steady his nerves. He stares at the floor for a long time after the door has closed and turns to look at Trey still hiding under the bed. Man that stuff hit the spot, well worth the small bit of bribes for the officers to get it... Nidnene could grumble all she wanted about drinking in front of the kits but she wasn't here now and such a small sip could hurt nobody. It wasn't like he was offering it to his kits damn it!

"You can come out now, son." He says leaning back rather casually in his chair, feeling the relaxing effect of the strong booze already. There's no answer from Trey.

"C'mon stop playing and come out, Trey. It's all dusty in there. You'll get your fur dirty." He frowns slowly getting impatient. He waits for full three minutes listening the child breathing rapidly under the bed. The flark was wrong with the kit?

"Okay, that's it, now get out of there already." Rocket grumbles in annoyance and lifts the bed up from the corner which only makes Trey scream "no" and scoot into farthest the corner under the bed from his father.

"Fine." Rocket barks resisting the urge to just throw the bed aside, lowering the bed back down instead. "Damn kits, I need a drink." He mutters giving a one more exasperated look towards his kit hiding under the bed and then looks at the already drained flagon before leaving and slamming the door shut behind him.

Trey hides under the bed for a good while more before he crawls out and climbs on the bed, shuffling a bit to hide under covers, all dusty. His partially fallen asleep by the time his notably inebriated father returns to check on him. He can feel his father coming closer, warm breath reeking of liquor and smoke leaf as he lowers down to sniff at his son's ears poking from under the blanket. He screws his eyes shut at this, just hoping his father to go away. His father... It wasn't difficult to accept that this male would be his daddy -his father, especially when mommy said he was and he'd been so nice to them but this; this male no longer felt like the one they'd found sleeping at the couch and who'd helped them to get out from the ruined stadium. He felt so alien now, so wrong. Maybe if daddy would stop drinking that smelly thing that adults drink and get all weird after... Yeah he'd tell daddy not to do it any more in the morning and daddy would stop doing it. Yeah, he'd do that as soon as that stranger hovering over the bed would go away. Trey though and with that comforting plan firmly in mind he slowly drifts back to sleep.

After those few agonizing minutes Rocket stands up without so much as sniffing loudly and tiptoes drunkenly out of the room to sleep at some place else for the remaining night.


	8. Chapter 8

## ch 8

## The dying grounds

 

 

She opened her eyes hesitantly as she slowly came back to her senses. The first things she noticed aside from her splitting headache were that she wasn't outside anymore, a wet rag had been placed on her brows and that somewhat older female Procyonian was hovering above her, then she noticed her strangely marked left ear. She had no idea what those weird arbitrary looking strings of faintly fluorescent dots, burned inside the older female's left ear, were supposed to mean aside from the obvious use an a prisoner-ID. Though Rocket could have probably told Nidnene what it was immediately, -a binary code etched in Badoon writing system, denoting the status, monetary value and usefulness of the slave prisoner in question along with each transgression, owner history and additional training which would be added to the tattoo and the chip that went with it, as they happened but Nidnene had no knowledge of that at the time. Of course it wasn't really a tattoo in the traditional sense but she wouldn't know that either until much later. Still it didn't take her long, even in this slightly staggered state, that she too was probably similarly marked.

"Easy now, don't move too fast. You had a nasty concussion. I'm Lenaire. You can tell me what happened if you wish or don't. It makes little difference here."

"Where-?" She started and the older female -Lenaire, spoke. "Slave barrack one hundred and forty six. Malcompliance is punished harshly. Remember that. This bunk is where you come back each night and will stand next to for the countdown, first offence is no food for a day, the second is caning and third... You don't want that, trust me -most won't make it to provoke a fourth penance. Work time is 12h a day with one food break at the morning and one in the middle. I advice taking care of your needs then as well, pausing for pissing during work time is a malcompliance. Smiling, crying and other public showing of emotion is also a malcompliance. Attacking a trustee is a malcompliance, attacking a guard will get you killed or beaten to inch of your life depending on your value. Showing up too dirty on the line at the morning is also a malcompliance. Planning to escape isn't a merely a malcompliance, it's a capital offence with immediate execution when caught and the entire barrack is punished collectively. "

"So, I'm in hell" Nidnene whispered looking around, careful not to sit up too fast. Her throbbing head felt like the size of a beach ball. They were inside a drab metal walled barrack with a long row of latrine pits at the centre of the rectangular room, one water main with a sink and dozens of metal bunk beds in four rows on stacks of four. There was a door at both far ends of the room. The female Lenaire was wearing a different body glove from hers, it had three diagonal white stripes forming a stacked chevron at the front. She noticed her looking at her dress. "I'm a trustee or Kapo as it's in the camp slang, the new masters can't govern everything here, you see. When the first batch of us arrived they attempted to implant us all with some kind of translation devices but most of us who were implanted, were lucky and died from the procedure -Those few of us who survived with our minds intact, were then made trustees to translate orders from our new masters and to explain the rules for the new slaves. Speaking of which; only speak when spoken to. While it's not a direct malcompliance, they don't like having the lesser creatures talking back or thinking that they might know better than heir betters."

"That's terrible." Nidnene gasped. Lenaire shrugged absently, rubbing the nape of her left ear. "There are worse fates than death, you'll see."

"I came here with two of my kits... I'll make a deal with you, you find out what happened to my kits and I'll owe you and trade some of my rations to sweeten the deal." She offers for the Trustee.

"A generous offer, I'll consider it." Lenaire says hopping down on the floor and freezes, turning to face the barrack door as it opened and three Badoon entered. They barked something to her to which she nodded and then shook her head. After a brief conversation she exits with the Badoon leaving Nidnene to lie at her bunk.

"Food is the only true commodity we slaves have here, you should be more careful about flaunting it." Nidnene gave a start at the sudden new voice and turned her head to regard another female looking down at her from above. she hadn't noted her being there before. She squinted at her while she climbed down to sit on Nidnene's bunk, looking carefully at the young but slightly disheveled looking female. There was something familiar about her but she couldn't quite place it.

"Don't recall me, huh? well that's to be expected. It wasn't like we were ever really introduced. I'm Danine." and the recognition hit Nidnene. "You're that chit trying to rob us with your friends! but weren't you..." She leaves it unfinished, trailing off when she realizes that the other one was no longer swollen from pregnancy.

"They happened... " She said, meaning the Badoon, while staring at the floor, clearly at the verge of tears despite fighting to keep her composure.

"They took mine as well. Lenaire has promised to find out where." Nidnene said scuttling closer to her to give a gentle shoulder squeeze.

"Lenaire!" Danine spat on the floor at the name. "That Kapo is more cruel than the crocodiles by the river and twice as devious. She's no friend of yours or mine. Even the other Kapos fear her. You may not like the news when you hear them, what they do with the Kits they pick... we might be better off not knowing. I've also heard rumors that our new lords have already started shipping off people. Starting from the male camps... I just hope my friends won't be picked. Better the devil you know... if you're getting me." She sighs wringing her paws together in a sort of anxious washing motions, probably not even realizing she was doing it.

"I see, are those other Kapos like her as well?" Nidnene asks quietly, resisting the urge to do the same with the blanket corner.

"No, most of the Kapos are sympathetic and do what they can but that one... I think she was bad from the start, but understand that despite having more leeway the Kapos are as chained as we are. Expect no help from anyone here but yourself."

"Wasn't really expecting anything less from this place." She admits feeling down.

"You should sleep as much as you can, it's a rare luxury. They'll put you to work come tomorrow." Danine reminds her before leaving Nidnene alone to lay down at the hard mattress where she blankly stares at the bottom of the bunk above her until the pull of sleep took over the worry for her kits, that was keeping her awake.

* * *

She looked in askance at the machine scanning her ear before grey slop was plopped on her tin bowl from the automated dispenser set-up at the yard. Even though it tasted slightly better than it looked her long experience as a an inn hostess immediately told her that the rations were obviously too small to sustain a healthy procyonian for long and she wasn't even going to debate on the skewed nutritional values. Touching it with her sensitive paw pads merely confirmed what her nose already suspected, it was some kind of "porridge" mostly consisting of plant proteins and (hopefully) animal fat.

Today's and apparently also the last and next week's work was mostly consisting of manual labor. Digging a trench for some kind of foundations with picks and shovels and clearing rubble to enlarge the camp for the future. It was boring, thankless and backbreaking work. The only joy she felt from it was the fact that the guards didn't seem to care all that much if they talked quietly amongst themselves as long as the picks and shovels kept on ringing.

"So this is what we're supposed to do, day after day?" Nidnene sighs already hating it after just a few scant hours." Danine looks at her with askance. "Keep that shovel moving! I don't mind chatting with you but it ain't worth the whipping." Nidnene looks a bit apologetic and gets back to work again.

"Tell you what. I'll tell you my story if you tell me yours." She offers a bit later.

"Why would you do that? Danine inquired quizzically.

"No reason really, just hoping it might help pass the time."

"Whatever, you go first since you're feeling so open all of a sudden." Danine sighs. If the other one wanted to prattle on she wasn't going to care and not probably even listen.

Nidnene peered their surrounding before starting to quietly retell how she and her kits were brought to the camp.

"Not everyone was a stranger to us here, but when we had arrived and been joined together with another line, we were then surrounded by people from all over the city and countryside. Not that we even wanted to hold a conversation, separated and surrounded by fear, as we were. I had no friends or relatives left to turn on for protection. Just the three of us, my children and I, were left and we held onto our each other's when without warning the guards separated the males from females and their kits into two separate columns, driving us to our respective holding barracks in a matter of few scant hours. That was when I had lost the sight of the last surviving males who had been living with us at the Inn.

Once inside those huge barracks we were told to strip down and they took away all clothes and possessions we had had when captured. The stench was terrible and the floors were crusted with Procyonid feces, we soon realized that no one had bothered to build even as much as a latrine pit and the barrack was so full, with more people being shoved in all the time, that you had little choice but to make your needs where you were standing and later you would be forced to stepping and even sleeping on some of it."

"You mean...They're all dead? The people you had gathered up with that weird mate of yours. Is he dead too? We heard of it, you know. Rumors move fast here." Nidnene didn't feel like answering, continuing from where she had left. All the while their picks and shovel s kept their steady sounds of work.

"It was bright, warm autumn morning when they finally let us out. I reckoned that we'd been kept without food for almost three days now locked inside those jam packed, filthy barracks. At first the youngest kits had wailed and whined but now everyone was equally tired and hungry and quiet. Despite the constant hunger, fatigue, fear and humiliating nudity and the guards, who strengthened their orders with electric whips, I felt invigorated by the fresh air. We were ushered onward by the guards assisting with their whips and monsters of Badoon standing and growling menacingly by the razor wire fences. I could see high towers jutting at the edges of the compound, manned with armed guards and heavy weapons."

Nidnene sighs and straightens her back a little before continuing with the shovelling and her story.

"My children and I walked forward with hesitant steps, behind and ahead of us dumb prisoners formed a long convoluted line. That morning we were just three lonely creatures among the clump of hundreds, perhaps thousands of prisoners - and I couldn't but wonder how many thousands had 'they' already processed through this facility, wearing worn-out and uncomfortable foreignly designed clothes, faces blank from fear. There was no smiling here, no recognizing gazes nor encouraging gestures. Only deep and foreboding fear. Most of us just stared down blankly at the ground beneath our feet, hardened by nameless masses, by those who before us had been driven through here. Poor beings who had become nothing but nameless carriers of fear and submission. Each of us would stand in line together but alone, without hope or salvation, only to hear their doom; to be carried out immediately -death or slavery. This war had so far lasted no more than two weeks but we already knew what to expect from the Badoon."

"You could say that again. I Feel weird thinking myself lucky to have stayed only a day or so in those damn barracks" Danine mutters darkly.

"The guards eyed us indifferently, but I knew they could lose their self-control and become brutally violent from the slightest of provocations. I had witnessed one such outburst earlier in the morning, when a guard had kicked a female prisoner to death right in front of her own kits just because he could. It happened in that huge big hall, where we had been gathered after the separation by sexes and been given our new clothes. The guards walked among us, making sure that nobody was stalling or trying to hide or smuggle anything from inside their old rags into new clothing before ceding their old garments away. This prisoner wasn't very old, she was perhaps even pretty and simply inquires something, perhaps something as innocent as water for her kits when I saw it happen. Without warning the guard struck at her with his gauntleted fist, putting all his strength behind the strike and hit her savagely on the neck. Felling her on the ground. the prisoner convulsed and gurgled, writhing in pain and tried to shield her body with her feeble arms when the guard jumped on her over and over. At first she screamed and howled from pain with each kick but soon she fell silent, having lost her consciousness. Her poor kits could only stare muted and a good thing they and everyone else did or he might have slain them too for interfering. Once she was clearly dead he rolled the body aside and looked around him as if waiting for a challenge against his brutal act, of course none came. Satisfied, he then scrubbed his boots clean on the dead female's clothes and waved two random prisoners to approach him. With plenty of hand waving and grunted unintelligible commands he ordered the body to be taken away. The carriers had no idea where to but they still took the body by the arms and legs and carried it outside somewhere. Within moments, a  hundred new feet were already stomping over the patch of blood where she had been murdered. Leaving no trace of this heinous act, except that terrible lingering fear in the witnesses hearts.

"Kits" I whispered. "We must be strong. We've got to hold on." They looked at me numb from fear. "Kits, we will survive, all of us. I promise."

"We dragged ourselves forward almost silent, just the scant wail, sigh or occasionally whispered prayers for any gods who might be listening. The morning sun gleamed at the guards armors and weapons, shiny metal boots and brass hued buckles, it shone from their slit pupil eyes watching us. Gigantic monsters stomped their feet. Slob running from their metal jawed mouths. Were they sensing our fear the way I smelt ours, acrid stench of dried sweat, which after days without shower had firmly clung to our bodies, the smell of urine and feces which we couldn't get rid of, the nauseating smell of sickness, hunger and unwashed teeth in our breath? I held on to my kits. We females packed closer to our each other in the long line, trying to find some common succor despite being complete strangers to one another.

I had managed to hold on to my kits thus far and now we were standing there, almost right in front of this unfeeling monster, in this long line with other females and their kits. The judgment kept on going and the rows leaped forward along with my poor heart. I still couldn't recognize any of the other prisoners with me. Not a word was spoken. We stood and waited in the broiling sun. I could hear the shuffling steps, weeping sniffs and gusts of anguish when kin were separated as more and more people were added to the lines but sharpest were the cracks from the guards whips and their angry cries while pushing the prisoners to move faster. Even from a distance I could hear the metallic crash of compound gates closing -a new batch had arrived, soon to be crammed inside those filthy barracks we'd just left vacated.

I silently counted what I had left: a plastic spoon and metal bowl, this uncomfortably coarse, loosely fitting grey body glove and my kits, but most of all we still lived and were together even though we hadn't eaten in days and had been forced to sleep in our own feces. Not all prisoners had been able to cope and many died from exhaustion or dehydration inside those steaming hot barracks. I could only scoff at those prideful guards standing in line by the fences, weapons at the ready, as if we haggard females and tired kits would have been able to cause any riot. Merely standing in a row for hours was more than some females were able to withstand and those who couldn't were unceremoniously dragged away never to be seen again.

The Badoon officer doing the next inspection was tall and well-proportioned enough that even I noticed it, standing proudly and basking at the attention, in front of the line, in his shining metal armor. The lord and center of this little slice of hell-on-earth. He would look at each prisoner coldly and calculating, looking for flaws or traits he deemed useful or useless, worth to be taken away now or for work. With scant emotionless hand jerks and barely with any words he judged us one by one. Each of us thought we knew what that meant."

"You're not wrong there, that's no 'doctor'. His a butcher. The worst. Pray you won't get sick and end under his 'care'. Danine curses almost whispering.

"I wasn't sure what the parameters were for us to be segregated, though the actual process was quick and surprisingly hands-off, it was no less harrowing. We were marched through some kind of metal arch and then sent either left or right"

 "Medical scanner and the hoses. That's the two alleys, formed from barbwire, as we've become to call them in the camp slang." Danine supplies helpfully. Nidnene nods thankfully.

"I was relieved that my kits were sent along the same 'hose' as me and we quickly moved to the next building at the end (and last before the actual camp grounds) where a line had already formed. The prisoners were led inside one-by-one and presumably then let out at the other side.

Only we never really got that far. Suddenly the guards approached us and grabbed a hold of my kits. I protested wildly but my claws and teeth were no use against their armors. I was kicked in the stomach for my troubles and fell face first on the dirt, all wind knocked out of my body. A guard placed his foot against my neck, pushing me harder against the ground and though I knew that if I'd move they'd likely kill me, I moved anyway. The last thing I heard, before I lost my consciousness, were my kits crying out."

"My kits... I would have probably delivered within a day or two anyway. That one, the Butcher, he didn't care. I was pointed out and grabbed from the line, ushered into some sort of operating theatre and then strapped into a table. I don't recall much after, only that they had taken my unborn kits. After that they washed, clothed and marked me, like some cattle, before releasing me into the compound." Danine confesses starting to stare blankly ahead, which prompts Nidnene to pat Danine hard on the back to get her back to 'reality'.

"We'll make them pay. One way or another." Nidenene promises with barely concealed rage.

"Bold words for a slave but damn if I'm going to waste away in this rotten camp." Danine agrees.

"I know, but it won't be easy and I won't leave without my kits." Nidnene reminds her and they both shut their yaps when a guard walks by.

The electronic work horn blares, signalling the end of the first half of shift. Climbing out from the huge pit via ladders without being rushed, Nidnene, for the first time had the actual time to really look at what they were working on. It seemed like an oval pit, a bit like underground stadium, maybe.

"Any idea what we're actually digging here for? she asked wearily from Danine.

"Before, I didn't know, didn't care. I just worked, but now... I think we should find out and fuck it to the best of our ability." She replies sounding much less petered than what she looked like.

* * *

Days started to fold together despite her attempts to track them, wake up -go to work at the pit -get back to barracks for the night, only real changes were brought by weather or occasional new people bringing rumors from outside. According to rumors something was happening outside, perhaps the war was reaching its climax? But even more worrying were move outs. People were being picked and taken away with increasing frequency but to where? Nobody knew, not even the Kapos or if they did they refused to talk about it. Lenaire had proven as mean as Danine claimed, dashing Nidnene's hopes of ever finding out what really had happened to her poor kits. The only end result of her incessant pestering was to get herself caned. The morning, following after her caning, started with a drizzle of rain which turned into a torrent as the day progressed towards noon. The lizards didn't care whether you were too young or too old, you still worked unless you were clearly too sick to even stand up. There were no exceptions or rainy day breaks from working at the pit.

There they were all drenched and miserable, crawling on their knees in mud, trudging waist high in rain water down at the pit, back and shoulders protesting in pain, both from caning and rigors of work. It was useless to dig or shovel the sludge out but they were told to do so anyway and she was slowly getting a feeling that they were not so much digging foundations but their own graves with this useless work.

"I think I've figured out what this is for." Nidnene mutters brushing wet soaked fur away from her eyes with the back of her grimy paw.

"Really?" Danine says without much enthusiasm.

"It's a placeholder, a way to keep us busy. To break us."

"how can you tell?"

"Think about it, these lizards can travel in space. Yet they put us into digging for a hole as if they didn't know what an excavator is... A machine digs in an hour what takes days by hand and we've been doing this for Maker only knows how long. Or haven't you noticed how they seem to choose the most meek and hard working when taking people away?"

"What else is new? Also still waiting on your master plan for the great escape..." Danine sighs sarcastically, shivering slightly from cold and Nidnene couldn't really blame her for 'quitting easily'. Even if they could escape, where would they go? There was no place safe left anymore, but she couldn't deny her yearning. They had to find a way out. She could already see some of her ribs and her once plump & fluffy tail now resembled something of a hairy rope than proper tail, the excess fat having dwindled away from the lack of adequate sustenance. Danine looked even worse and had contacted some kind of cough that was gradually getting worse. there had to be a way out before they'd both die in this pit.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not entirely happy with this chapter despite the feeling that it needed to be written.


	9. Chapter 9

## Chapter 9

## In to the final days

 

"C'mon kit let's get you washed up and I could use a shower myself as well." Rocket notes wrinkling his nostrils in distaste while watching his son over the table, after finishing his own breakfast. Trey doesn't say anything, concentrating with finishing his plate. Well, at least his appetite has returned, Rocket remarks with a small relief. One less thing to worry about.

The shower room was about as spartan as Rocket had assumed it to be. Boring white tiling on the floors and walls at the showers. Smoothed out grey natural stone walls and metal cabinet rows with pegs to hang your gear at the dressing room. He placed Trey to sit on the bench next to a pile of towels while undressing himself and his son. He kneels to Trey's level to scrub his chest and back with a sponge. Since Trey had the casts, they'd have to be careful to avoid them getting wet.

"Did it hurt Daddy? When you got them." Trey asks curiously and touches at one of the visible cybernetics at Rocket's collar with a tentative finger, having never before seen his father's implants.

"What? No, not that much. Though some others did. I was... pretty young, I think. Why'd you ask?" Rocket says suddenly standing up from crouch, making Trey swivel his ears curiously at the sound of Rocket's internal servos.

"Just wondering when I'll start growing mine. I hope they'll look as nice as yours." The kit replies innocently, making Rocket almost drop the shower head, his holding, from surprise. He blinks for a moment unable to word a reply until he suddenly remembers that his still holding the detachable showerhead and what he was supposed to do with it. The kit takes the cue as a reason to add. "I mean you're a robot, daddy. So aren't we going to be too when we grow up?"

"Ahh, umm... It doesn't quite work like that Trey and you're not suddenly going to start growing metal parts through your skin and I'm not a robot. A Cyborg, yes, but not a robot and you shouldn't call a cyborg a robot, son. It's considered as insulting to us." Rocket explains evasively and can't help but wonder why the kit couldn't be asking something easy or 'safe like 'where does the babies come from' or something to that effect.

"But why daddy?" Trey asks, turning around so suddenly at the ladder stool his sitting on, while his back is being showered, that Rocket sprays him right in the face with it. Which makes them both giggle a bit, breaking the tension.

"So, you wanted to know what's the difference between a cyborg and a robot, son?" Rocket asks draping his son with towels, whose drying fur is starting to look comically buff and is giving the kit the spikiest hairdo ever. Trey mumbles something into towel which Rocket takes as a yes.

"A Robot is an artificially created machine who is bound by a program it was created with to perform a set task. A cyborg is... well a person who has been implanted with mechanical parts, usually for medical reasons like losing an eye or hand." The kit nods seemingly satisfied with the answer until he suddenly pipes up "Then why do you have them?". The one question Rocket fears and has no answer,  not out of shame but because even he didn't know for sure even though he could and had made many educated  guesses overtime. "I'll explain when you're a bit older." Rocket says retreating behind the age old parental cop-out to avoid answering which the kit accept with a child-like 'okay daddy'.

They had been given new quarters to be together and some toys for Trey and new clothing for both of them to wear, while they were showering. Rocket was disgruntled that their clothing choices were still very limited despite being better than the 'rags' they were wearing previously. He clothed Trey into shirt and pants which he guessed to be fairly fashionable, seeing as how the kit was happily humming and looking at himself from all angles from a small wall mirror while he'd had to settle on cargo pants, crew jacket and high collared dress shirt in that weirdly ubiquitous drab olive green. Strange how every damn army in the Galaxy seemed to have those same three palette colors for dress uniforms, the other two being varying hues of grey & white.

"You be a good kit now, Trey. I've got some things to do with the military but I'll be back afternoon." Rocket says when a soldier appears to escort him to the meeting. The kit just hums in return, already completely engrossed in playing with his new toys on the floor.

* * *

 

Rocket eyed the assembled people sharply when he walked in to the auditorium room. Of the twenty or so people gathered, he could recognize only Samase and some of the 'stooges' as people who had interrogated or treated him some days ago. She's standing separately from the other people in the room, chatting with a group of three others. They notice his scowl with varying levels of acceptance. Samase cuts the awkward silence by taking the lead with introductions when Rocket gets closer.

"May I formally introduce you to our Invasion response-team, Rocket. You've probably already noted that I'm the head of intelligence & security, this is Dr. Kevorken Miles -the head of medical & science team."

To which Rocket nods curtly "yes we've met" .

"Commander Ravn Nightshade is representing for the military." She continues indicating at the tall and rather handsome officer in olive green dress uniform, who nods politely at his name. "And of course our team-coordinator Lyoko Talltree, the Chairman of the planetary intelligence & defense committee."

"So nice to meet you in person Galactic guardian ranger Rocket the Raccoon, and while it's unfortunate to meet the representative from off-world under situation like this, I hope you don't take it personally." The man greets proving Rocket that his statesman-like funk wasn't merely a feeling. Hopefully the guy would turn out to be more than just a career politician, in Rocket's books those people were pretty much useless.

"Right, Yeah, I'm Rocket Raccoon, founding member of the Guardians of the Galaxy, Chief-Ranger of Halfworld and the Custodian of the Keystone quadrant and I'm here to show you how to kick some Badoon but!." Rocket announces loudly and confidently enough that everyone in the room could hear and notice him. "Now show me what you've got so far." He says more subdued to his new 'colleagues''.

"I guess I should thank you for looking after my kit Agent." Rocket says quietly to Samase once they're all seated and the chairman opens the meeting by laying out their current situation.

Samase squints curiously before getting a hold of herself, replying smoothly. "Ohh... thank you mister Raccoon, the least I could do." Though Rocket was pretty sure she had no idea what he was talking about but it wasn't important right now, what was important was this meeting.

"Right you people... before we're going to get rid of those lizards..." Rocket announces rising from his seat to take Lyoko's spot at the podium. "We're going to have to move our base."

"Move?" someone calls out and Rocket raises his hands to quell the commotion.

"Right, I keep forgetting you people aren't used to this... I'll start slowly. How many of you have knowledge in nuclear physics and hyper-Euclidean math or quantum theory? Anyone?"

_*crickets*_

Until Dr. Miles raises a tentative paw. "I think I know what you're aiming at Mr. Raccoon, the potential of using the energy of splitting hydrogen atoms to produce electricity is widely used and its use a possible weapon has been discussed but..."

"Good, so at least one person here knows what I'm talking about when I say 'thirty kiloton thermo baric payload carried in a ballistic missile, launched from orbit to land on our very doorstep." Rocket announce and the room goes into another confused mumbling except for Dr. Miles who looks rather pale at Rocket's announcement.

"You sure about this. That they can do it just like that?" Lyoko inquires suddenly worried, and though he hides it well, the fear is evident in his eyes.

"Hah, it's the least they can do... You people still haven't quite grasped our situation, which admittedly is my fault since I haven't really stressed it... The Badoon don't just destroy cities and take slaves, they conquer whole star systems and destroy the planets they can't keep. They just blow them up! Destroying this keep is easy as breathing to them. I could do it too if I'd wanted to." Rocket announces and the true gravity of the situation finally sinks in to the audience.

* * *

 

"So, according to you, there's nothing we can do but to surrender or they'll just blow the whole planet and move on?" Commodore Nightshade asks watching Rocket working with some kind of tubular object, not really sure what he was creating even after the off-worlder had given him a laundry-list of required materials and ordered them to bring him tools for cutting glass and diamond.

"Oh no, I never said that but it also means that our HQ & troops have to be asymmetric and on the move constantly, it's our only defence. Blowing up a whole planet takes time to prepare, which will be our operational window to oust them, let's not make this easier for the lizards than it already is." Rocket explains fiddling with a metal tube in his paws. "Okay it's in, let's try this out." he says lifting the tube to his eye level and switches it on by touching a small knob at the side. Bluish 3ft long 'blade' flickers to life. Rocket makes a few swirls with it before cutting out the corner end from the metal workbench.

"Oh, okay now." Ravn mumbles flabbergasted which Rocket mistakes as the man being unimpressed. "I know, Photon blades are pretty outdated, plasma sword is better and more easy to handle but this is better than nothing in such a short notice. Don't worry I'll make a training model for the weapon as well, so your boys don't cut their toes in accident while practising... Now the flechette gun here, also known as Ripper bolt pistol... however being an old design, it's still an oldie but goldie. The pistol's done and I'll have a working riffle schematics ready for you by tomorrow." Rocket shrugs already moving on to the next weapon he had created while Ravn finds it hard to avoid staring at the table corner cut-out on the floor and the "photon blade", as Rocket called it, on the table.

"So it shoots arrows?" Ravn asks now sceptically, he had expected the next item to be something that was even more flashy than the 'ray sword'. Rocket just shrugs and correct Ravn with a wry smile. "Supersonic, recoilless darts that can pierce pretty much anything and be modified to carry all-sorts of payloads. Magnetize the dart to bypass force fields, oversize the design and they cut through even tanks and advanced spaceships."

"Then why aren't you using them?" Ravn asks curiously, remembering how Rocket had very different type of weapons as his sidearm. "They're loud and despite having relatively long range, their effective lethal range is average at best and the magazine is very small in comparison to my photon pistols. I also don't like having to count for the wind when I shoot." Rocket replies Expertly.

"I see, so how long do you think it'll will take to get enough of these mass-produced?" Ravn accepts with interest. "I can create the prints for the automated machinery to be done in a day or so. After that we should be able to produce a working weapon in roughly once every 15 minutes." Rocket promises which makes Ravn whistle a little between his teeth.

* * *

 

At the afternoon Rocket returns to their quarters as promised and takes his son for a walk around the base to show the kit what his dad actually did 'for a living'. They've barely reached the hangar area when Rocket notices a new plane fuselage under a tarp at the hangar area with a suspicious amount of engineers hovering around it. Agent Brightwater is busily overseeing the loading of the plane into a moving rig. As per Rocket's earlier suggestions, evacuation of the base was already well under way.

"I see you've been busy, Agent." Rocket comments dryly to Samase, who turns to look at him while smiling brightly to Trey. "Ahh, Guardian Ranger. Bringing your son to work, so to speak?"

"It's good for the kits to know what their parents do for a living, speaking of work. What's under the tarp?"

"Oh just some kind of enemy shuttlecraft, a wreck that was found in a barn not too far from here, figured it might be worth dismantling and reverse-engineering."

"That might not be the best idea." Rocket says ears flattening. "Why not? you think it might be dangerous to do?" Samase asks now concerned. "No, I'm telling you because it's MINE."Rocket growls showing his canines.

"Wow, you own a spaceship, daddy? Can I see it!" Trey yips in awe.

"Well, yeah. How else would I get here? it's like 3 parsecs from the Galacian wall to the last marker." Rocket snorts snidely. "There's no need to be rude." Samase replies grumpily.

" What's a Galacian wall and what markers? Parsec? is that a unit of distance in space?" She then inquires sharply.

Rocket eyes her thoughtfully for a moment, realizing that Procyon-6 probably doesn't have what it takes to send even a probe outside their immediate star system yet.

"Ahh, okay... Oh man, I keep forgetting how -primit- -how _much_ you don't know." The slip doesn't go unnoticed from Samase.

"Anyway, the Galacian wall is this gigantic force field around the Keystone quadrant, -it's the area of space we're in by the way, to keep it safe from outside influence, built aeons past. Inside the quadrant there are these 'markers' which you can use to navigate through the 'empty' or 'dark sectors' as we spacers call areas where there's no stars or planets, just asteroids and gasses and dust. In any case there are six markers in the most direct route between Procyon-6 and Halfworld, one per roughly half a parsec. There used to be only two until I added the rest while mapping out the keystone wild space. Halfworld system is at the very edge of the quadrant, almost hugging the wall itself.  One parsec is about 3.26 light-years or 19 trillion miles... Well you get the point why you've no idea of these things existing, yes?" He adds perhaps a bit snidely.

"That may be but you haven't told me what you're going to do with your ship now." she notes feeling tad offended at tone Rocket is displaying.

"First I need to see what kind of damage you've done to it. Don't worry I'm not flying it anywhere without my suit and she's not going anywhere within the atmosphere without her wings attached." Rocket notes to Samase over his shoulder while walking closer with awestruck Trey to pull off the tarp covering it. "Let him." she comments shortly to her engineers when they aim to thwart Rocket.

"Okay let's see now... want to ride in a real spaceship, son?" Rocket asks mostly rhetorically from his son while taking a mental stock of the visible damages, circling the small craft. He then does something with the hidden panel at the bottom side of the cockpit fuselage to have a section of it and cockpit canopy to slide aside and small set of stairs to fold down and lifts his son to sit at the co-pilot seat before closing the canopy. Ignoring the frantic shouting and fists banging against the sides from outside that follows it, to which Rocket just waves disinterestedly. He then reached over Trey to push a few buttons on the dash in front of his son. Low humming engulfs the cockpit and the screens glow to life. Trey gasps in excitement. Rocket then does something with the interface to have the craft's A.I reboot and then go through an automated systems checklist.

"Well, what do you think, son. Neat isn't it?" Rocket asks from Trey sitting at co-pilot/passenger seat. "All these buttons... So wicked. Is it fast. Can I fly it?" The kit replies turning and craning his head and neck to take in all the sights. His father wasn't paying much attention, having engrossed himself with going through the contents of a footlocker placed behind the seats to work both as a storage and temporary seating. There's not much room for anything else in the cockpit and even a child as young as Trey had to wonder at just how little space his father seemed to require.

"If you promise me to be good while I'm away Trey. I promise I'm taking you for a flight to see what space is like when this is over." Rocket says rummaging through his things in the locker to find anything which might be useful in the future. "Away, where are you going daddy?" The kit asks suddenly worried.

"We're still at war son. I can't take you with me on missions. You'll need to stay with these nice people while I'm gone." Rocket explains patiently while carefully lifting his son back on the ground from the ship.

"Leave the ship here. I'm going to need it for reconnaissance flight in space to see the Badoon fleet compositions and hopefully figure out how they got here. It shouldn't be possible for them to cross the wall." He tells Samase who thinks this for a moment before giving a curt nod. "I don't see a reason why not. We need to know in any case. When do you think you'll be able to leave if I lend you a crew to help fix it?"

"Day after tomorrow. According to ship diagnostics there's nothing seriously wrong with it aside from the wings that you've removed. So it's just a routine check after crash to make sure everything works before I takeoff. I'm also going to need my suit & weapons  back as well and they better be intact."

 


	10. chapter 10

## chapter 10

## To the Temple of the kings

"Hey boss, what if they're already planning an expedition for it but aren't telling us, I've also heard that the boss man's going back to space?"  Asked the ruddy furred Raccoonoid, aptly named Eir 'the red' Longfellow, who was accompanying Roork at the personnel cafeteria of the Aerie.

"Why'd you think that? They've no effin reason to hold the info except the fact that it's luridiculous to think there's some kind of sinister plot going on to keep us from going. As far as I'm concerned Guardian Ranger's a big damn hero and if his going to fly off into space it's for a reason." Roork counters though he has to admit to himself that they really hadn't been allowed see their leader nor his kit in days, once they had been released from the brig, and the 'suits' had been very tightlipped about everything when asked. Which, while not necessarily alarming, was still peculiar since Rocket had emphasized how time was at the issue with his plans to defeat the invaders from space and as far as Roork could see Rocket had done nothing wrong in leading their rag-tag band of guerillas. In fact if the rumors were true, his wasn't even the only one. Roork had heard whispers of at least one other band of survivors besides theirs that was fighting back.

"I don't know boss, I guess I'm just getting itchy and bored." Eir sighs raking the long reddish forelock back from his eyes, a characteristic which had gained him the moniker -red.

"I know. Tell the guys to ready up, we're leaving tonight with Junior lieutenant Underhill but we do it quietly. I want no hassle with the govt. people and most positively to void any kind of shootouts. I'll see if I can get in contact with boss in the meanwhile and if not... Well, I'm sure the Guardian Ranger would agree that we've got more pressing matters to attend than waste and wait for the end holed up inside this worthless relic of a bunker." Roork says lowering his voice in conniving manner.

"You're saying that his staying here of his own volition and we're just leaving him behind if he disagrees?" Red frowns disbelievingly.

"No! Of course not but neither am I going to do anything hasty until I've seen him or gained a word from him, besides I don't think they could hold him up against his will if he really wanted to leave." Roork says shaking his head.

"Yeah, the boss-man isn't a one to be chained and probably wouldn't want us dicking around with his plans... Though I'll still say this is a fool's errand." Eir the Red agrees disgruntled and Roork can hardly blame the man for getting impatient or disbelieving in the legend of the Temple of the Kings.

Temple of the Kings was a myth, a camp fire story, no more than a hoary local legend at best which Underhill had somehow dug up from the archives. It was patently stupid to place your hopes on something like that but he'd given his word. Given it in a guilt ridden moment after nearly braining the poor lad but to Roork it made no difference. What was given was given and wouldn't be taken back.

* * *

"You're off to find the what now? Rocket asks looking up at Roork from his work, clearly expecting an explanation. "The temple of the Kings, somewhere in the valleys of shade. It's a huge depression caldera with mountainous  ridges and deep gorges crisscrossing it. Surrounded by arid region called the great desolation at the centre of the continent."

"Sounds like a wild goose chase to me." Rocket scoffs dismissively. "It probably is but I've given my word and what if Underhill is right and there really is some kind of super weapon there, left by the makers?"

"I doubt it, Myceians aren't known for leaving much artifacts behind, aside from some musty records and empty ruins." Rocket counters.

"Myceian?" Roork mouths.

"You call them 'Makers' which is fairly accurate term to describe their civilization at its peak. Creation and shaping was kind of their stitch, particularly the shaping of life... They held much territory around here, including Keystone quadrant -which was close to the heart of their assumed place of power, hence the name Keystone quadrant. I'm fairly sure they were the ones who created the great Galacian wall as well, just before the fall of their empire."

"What happened to their empire and how do you know all this?"

"Nobody knows for sure. At some point all forces were called off from Keystone and other areas surrounding their home system and then they were no more -or at least all surviving records end there and their race vanishes, almost as if they'd never even existed. Even the name and location of their home planet and system have been lost, in fact even the name Myceian is under dispute. It was given by a race called Ariguan and in their language it simply means "threat from beyond the suns". As to how I know all this. Well, I used to be something what professional archeologists derogatorily call as Tomb raiders, a professional treasure hunter, if you will. A less risky side job than bounty hunting to fill my time when there wasn't any immediate crisis or big bounties going on. Though I've mostly given up on those two vocations since we formed the Guardians of the Galaxy."

"Well, I'll be sure to bring you a souvenir if we find anything, boss." Roork smiles dryly.

"You'll do that and I'll be sure to give you a nice cut after we sell it. Intergalactic museums and collectors pay top price for anything that's verifiably Myceian artifact." Rocket says and Roork gives a small mischievous wink in return.

For the first time after confronting his boss Roork really started to pay attention to what his superior was doing -fiddling with that strange armor of his and stuffing some choice things of his from the table on to a burlap satchel. "So you're really doing it? Going back to space, I mean. I'd hoped you to come with us."

"I have to go get help, Roork. We can't beat them on our own without outside aid -or rather not fast enough. I'm also going to need a favor from you." Rocket says sounding resigned. "from whom and what kind of favor? You've said yourself that we're cut off from the rest of the galaxy."

"The Badoon are here in force which means there has to be a way out for them as well... I'm going to find it, fly in an automated communications buoy, use it to get a subspace message through for my team and then get the flark out of dodge before the Badoon notice what's going on. No way in hell am I going to dogfight the entire Badoon armada with that tiny shuttle. It's a big risk... So in case I won't make it -someone's got to care for Trey. He knows you and the others. I feel it would be best if our people could take care of him."

" Aye, I'm sure there's no shortage in our people who are willing to do that." Roork nods approvingly. "Sounds like a plan then..." Rocket then gives him a thoughtful look before sliding the burlap satchel over the table. "What's this?" Roork asks accepting the bunched up satchel. "Just some things I've cobbled up and figured you could use to help you on your way." Rocket says nonchalantly. "Much obliged." Roork thanks with a nod after peeking inside. He rises up and clutches the satchel against his chest. "Noted. Now get going. I fear we won't have much time left to waste." Rocket says dismissing him.

* * *

He wanted to let Trey know about his decision regarding the kit's parenting in case of his father's demise but he couldn't find the kit anywhere. "Probably wandered off to somewhere to sulk." Rocket decided with a small sigh. The kit had slowly gotten bored and developed a habit of hobbling around the base, exploring it and getting lost despite Rocket and many others trying their best to keep the kit happy but there was no way around the fact that Trey had no one else close to his own age to play with at the base. Rocket was on a schedule and couldn't really spare the time to look for him properly, so he did the next best thing by informing his people about the decision and that Trey had wandered off again. Despite everything, Rocket wasn't really worried about his son getting into trouble or danger. Most people in the base genuinely liked the kit and there was no way he could sneak out without being noticed.

"No goodbyes or well-wishes. Wow that's cold." Rocket joked to Samase who was watching him putting on his suit. "I could ask you to be careful out there and all that but you already know it, so why bother?" She says as Rocket picks the newly repaired helmet from the table and walks out from the locker room and to the hangar area with her. "It's the principle, a sign of care, doesn't really matter if its repetitive or needless." Rocket says "Well how's this for a principle, hero?" Samase says suddenly grabbing and kissing Rocket deep on the mouth before taking a few steps to back away from befuddled Rocket. "I can get behind that principle." He says, still smiling as he places his helmet on before climbing into his ship for takeoff.

* * *

"Ships!" Rocket gasps strafing hard but still almost slamming into them when he clears the upper atmosphere. He zigzaggs through the enemy fleet in break neck speed, disappearing like a ghost, unseen and unknown. "So many!" On the surface he'd assumed the new lights as comet clouds. "Thousands of them." It wasn't the vast armada that stunned him but that they were here at all. It shouldn't be, couldn't be. Even if one maybe two troop carriers would get through, it was one time only chance, but this... There was no way they could've crossed the wall in such force.

Rocket bit down the rising despair he felt was building. The further he travelled, the more endless the Badoon fleet seemed to be. Stretching beyond his sight and sensor range in long snaking lines like wagon trains to the stars. He knew he couldn't evade their fleet for long, not even with the cloaking device. So far it had worked because the Badoon hadn't expected anything like his ship coming out from such a backward planet and they had been unprepared for it.

There! He knew it! They hadn't gone through the wall! They'd gotten around it!  Rocket though with much elation when the great dark jagged rift at the end of the endlessly long column of ships came to view. Somehow the Badoon had got their hands on dark energy-tech. The energy spike signature and visual cues matched but how the Badoon had gotten the tech wasn't as important as getting the message buoy out and through this artificial rift that had been ripped into very fabric of space & time. Even just a short pulse from the buoy should be enough to get the Guardians and Nova to the scene. Fly it in and get out, that's it.

The reason he was hella nervous was, because the moment he'd launch it, his ship's cloak would drop and dropping it in the midst of the Badoon invasion fleet was asking for trouble.

"Fuck them!" Rocket decides, finger hovering over the switch commanding the buoy launch. This would be one of the few moments in his life where he really wouldn't mind 'dying for the cause'.

* * *

Three days on the road. Two days of driving without stopping aside from changing drivers to reach the edge of the badlands of the Great desolation, made Roork vividly recall why he'd always disliked travelling by cars. "Well, we're here. Where to now?" He sighed rhetorically, looking at the vast expanse of arid wasteland through the windshield. Deep ravines and snow topped peaks looming before them beyond the steep rocky rim of the gigantic depression. They'd stopped by to refuel their vehicles and to properly rest for the night before the real hardships would begin. There was no use taking the vehicles down to the bottom of the depression and the unpredictable updrafts and uneven ground made flying down too hazardous for planes and hovercrafts. "Shit... Should've brought some fucking wings or something,  ya know." Tam Two-trees complained irritably. "Gliders would've been handy, yeah." Roork agreed dismounting the vehicle. "If I'm reading this detector-thing we got from the Guardian Ranger properly. We should be able to locate the Temple within a few days at the most." Underhill nods waving the brick-sized thingy with an LCD-display in front of him. "That's nice... what about those verses you found from the archives, they matching like at all?" Eir grunts revealing his deep set distrust with high tech in general.

"The verses spoke of finding the eagle rock at the year of the fox and to follow the sound of the black bells into crescent canyon... Whatever that means." Underhill admits lowering the energy spike detector." Guess we'll just have to figure it out as we go, now won't we?" Roork says before walking off to boss people around, still sitting at the two other vehicles, into laying their camp site before it got dark.

"Well good thing it wasn't a red rock at dawn..." Tam huffs commenting on the fact that pretty much the whole basin seemed to be composed of that same banded reddish hued sedimentary rock as far as the eye could see,  giving the depression its quite depressing look from which it had gotten it's name. "Hue, hue, hue. Mock all you want." Underhill grunts not finding the youngling's comment all that funny.

* * *

Eir the Red might have been a bit of a luddite at heart but he was by far the finest ranger & tracker Roork had ever met. Between the time it took them to set up their camp and sun to set, Eir had already wandered off and  back, found and brought down three game birds and some kind of furry critter. Bringing them back to camp with him. Animals whose species Roork didn't even know.

"Well, it certainly seemed to be a good eve for hunting." He commends at his subordinates haul. "Nah, I actually got a bit lucky with that Pompanole rat." Eir shrugs and starts to dress the game ignoring the admiring stares for his catch. The fresh game meat proved to be a wonderful way to raise spirits. They'd all gotten tired on their forced diet of canned preservatives and cereals already.

* * *

"You sure this is it? looks pretty steep, I'm not even sure if we have enough rope..." Roork asks from Eir, looking down dubiously at the steep slope Eir had proffered as being their best route down. "Yeah, I'm sure boss. You're right that there's not enough rope to get all the way down but we should only need to climb two-thirds down with it anyway and then tie a new line. I'm pretty sure I can see a route down for the last third already."

"Which way, Underhill?" Roork asks folding his topography map open on one of the more flat topped stones for the others to see , setting stones on the corners to weight it open. "Well, this part here looks promising... It's higher ground than other parts of the depression floor and the ravines form a sharp sickle curve about here..." Underhill says tracing the map with his fingertip. "A day, maybe two on foot. though I don't like that ridge cutting through there, It's marked as pretty rugged." Eir comments tapping the spot on the map. "Well it's not like there's much choice if we're going to be there and back in time..." Two-trees nods.

"Okay then. You four, Longfellow, Underhill, Two trees and Lowlander, you're with me. Hold the fort until we're back Greyle. If we're not back in three days. We probably aren't coming." Roork orders placing his trust to Eir's so far impeccable wilderness skills. "If mister Raccoon's right, it won't even matter whether you come back or not if there's nothing to find..." Greyle replies pessimistically.

The bottom of the ravine they lowered themselves in was just about as uneven as it had seemed from above. Great Raccoonoid sized boulders dotted the bare banks of the dry river bed in every direction.

"Shit, I hope it doesn't rain often here at this time of the year." Eir comment crunching his brows.

"Why? You hate getting wet or something?" Lowlander asks peering at their surroundings with slight disinterest. "No Arik, I just don't like being in a deep ravine when it starts to rain hard. Flashflood's no joke." Eir grunts back.

"You sure it's there, Vren? I mean really sure." Roork asks sharply from Underhill who stops staring at the energy signature detector Rocket gave them and nods almost painfully. "Yeah I'm sure. Both the map and this detector point beyond that landslide, which used to be the "eagle rock" I wager seeing how it has toppled down all the way from up there." He points at the cliffs some fifty feet above where it was obvious that some kind of large boulder or cliff-side had been before sliding down to block the ravine.

"Ohh goody." Lowlander grunts looking dubiously at the huge pile of earth and boulders blocking their path in to the next ravine. "My words exactly. It also looks unstable." Longfellow says after a moment of scrutiny. "And no time to find another way round. Aww shit, just get the gear ready boys. We're climbing over it." Roork orders, feeling exasperated at the setback and suitably wary of the prospect of having the mound collapse when they're climbing over it.

"Nah, it's no use boss. There's nothing to stick the pitons where they'd hold." Eir denies after dropping back on the ground after the third try of attempting to attach a line on the mound with rock pitons. "Great, so we climb without it. Damn it." Roork orders spitting on his palms for show. His trope gives him a wary look before agreeing with sullen muttering.

Eir ascends first to show the route for the others and to attach a line on top to help climbing once he gets on top, followed by Underhill and Roork while Arik -being the heaviest would climb as last. "Hey guys, This rockslide's smaller than we thought but really loose so watch it!" Eir calls, who was already on top and had thrown a line down after finally having found a suitable spot to attach it. "Acknowledged!" Roork yelled back just as he saw Underhill's grip slip on a loose stone above him. He acted without thinking, grabbing his falling companion just as he was about to tumble past and held on to the rope for his dear life as the whole mound side fell down from under him.. until a chunk of falling stone conked him out causing them both to tumble down at the no considerably less steep slope.

"Oh shit! Oh shit, Hey Boss, come on man. Don't be dead!" Both Eir and Underhill mumble frantically as he came back to his senses. "Yeah, yeah, I'm alive... Arghh! My arm! watch it, damn it!" Roork curses loudly when Eir & Vren  are digging and pulling him free from the loose pile of dirt he'd been half buried in. his head hurt and scalp was bleeding, and right arm had probably been broken. Vren and Eir were pretty much the pictures of health in comparison. Eir was merely dusty and his ankle was swollen while Underhill had cuts and scratches all over but nothing serious it seemed. "So what about Arik and Tam are they...?" He asks already guessing it while getting a sip of water and having his arm taken care of by Underhill who was surprisingly good with it. "Yeah, Lowlanders a true flatlander now. Tam's okay, though he dislocated his shoulder but we fixed it. He went to get some water from that pool we saw earlier" Eir sighs sadly and vaguely points at the mound. "There's no digging Arik out of there without an excavator." Vren agrees. "Think you can continue, guys? 'cause I ain't climbing for shit anymore." Roork admits tiredly. "I can barely walk ten paces without a stick, my ankle's totally busted and Tam won't be holding from anything with that shoulder of his until it heals". Eir responds sitting next to Roork with a heavy thud. They both turn to look at their only able member Vren Underhill. "Well, I guess this it then guys?" The young man nods gulping loudly, realizing that the whole mission is now on his shoulders. "Get going lad, there ain't much light left." Eir reminds him and hobbles over to collect some dry twigs to set a meager fire for the night. "yeah, we ain't coming. Good luck. Take all you think you might need." Roork reminds Vren, throwing his and Eir's packs towards the still dithering officer. Vren licks his lips before nodding and grabbing what usable was still remaining in the packs after being crushed by the rockslide. He makes a quick military salute  before leaving and disappearing into lengthening shadows.

"Think he'll make it all the way, boss?" Tam asks as he sets a dented mess kit to hang over the fire to boil some water for tea. "Depends on how far that blasted temple-thing actually is from here, assuming it actually exists... To be honest, whether he makes it or not -which I sincerely hope, it's out our hands either way.  We've done all we can to ensure it." Roork admits accepting a cup from Eir who sits down next to him.

* * *

 He practically drags himself up the endless steps, hearing a cong going on inside his head. He takes a ragged breath and reaches for the last step to drag himself over with his arms when a hand grasps them and helps him to stand up shakily. "I am Saren the Maker. Welcome. I've been excepting you for some time." The figure greets throwing back his hood. The figure does not speak yet he hears him loudly.

Vren looks up at the giant in brown hooded rope. Pale hairless arms, man's arms. He noted off-hand without really registering it. To his credit he doesn't scream, panic or really even gasp at seeing this most alien looking being. Despite the alien features of his host, his somehow most certain that his host is much older than he is and means no harm. Vren Underhill nods silently and begins the final stretch through the open gates to the temple of the Kings and the fabled rings of the nine virtues.

* * *

 He stumbles lightly as he exits the last ring. he looks around him, it's almost dawn. He knows he should rest now, perhaps say something profound, words to be remembered. The feeling passes. Words aren't needed -Words that everyone once used felt now obsolete, and so are the deeds of great men whose names were once on everyone's lips. For all things fade away, becoming the stuff of legend, and are soon buried in oblivion.

The parting words of Saren the Maker echo in his mind as he descends the same countless stairs that once brought him up to heavens.

"Mind you, this is true only for those who blazed once like bright stars in the firmament, but for the rest, as soon as a few clods of earth cover their corpses, they are 'out of sight, out of mind.' In the end, what would you gain from everlasting remembrance? Absolutely nothing. So what is left worth living for? This alone: justice in thought, goodness in action, speech that cannot deceive, and a disposition glad of whatever comes, welcoming it as necessary, as familiar, as flowing from the same source and fountain as yourself."


	11. chapter 11

## chapter 11

## Falling down

 

Rocket had made his peace with what might yet be his undoing and aligned his scouting ship with the gate, readying it for the strafing run -maneuver. He would have about ten seconds window to release the buoy and get the hell out of dodge before the automated defences around the gate could lock-in. He was still playing the possibilities through his mind when his musing was interrupted by series of loud clanks from the storage chest's direction behind his seat.

Alarmed, Rocket terminated the vector and immediately took off before the ship's cloak could be compromised. Changing the course towards the ninth moon of Procyon-4, the nearest stellar body.

He wasted barely any time in landing on the rocky surface before throwing the trunk lid open. There were a couple of things Rocket might have reasonably expected to find  as a reason for the odd noise but a pair of little brown eyes and a furry snout were definitely not among them. Frankly he was shocked and almost had a heart attack when the first three barely audible words his son wheezed out were "Daddy... I can't breathe..." while simultaneously gasping for air like a fish on a pier.

'The fuck son? how did you?- never mind. Got to DO... something, anything. Oh my gods don't die on me kit. Daddy fixes, don't you worry, oh my god, what flark?!" Were the first words out of panicking Rocket's mouth. He wasted a lot of precious seconds just to get a grip of his own panicked state never mind his slowly suffocating son.

Perfect tactical instincts to the rescue! He was so shocked that he barely even registered what he was doing consciously and allowed his instinctual awareness to guide his actions.

Medical scan. Done. Hypothermia, low oxygen saturation due to thin, basically just a residual  cabin atmosphere. No broken bones detected beyond already known injuries. Good. Next. The emergency suit... emergency suit... FLARK! Where the hell... Oh there. Okay, good. Stuff the kit into it. Hook the suit into ship Oxygen supply outlet. Done. Breath man, breath. It'll be alright just relax... the kit will be fine now.

Rocket would have dried sweat from his brows if he wouldn't have had the suit on. So he did the next best thing and leaned forward until his head hit the knees and let out a slow tired groan before refocusing on his son, now seated and definitely and firmly belted to the co-pilot seat. Space was no place for kits but since he couldn't just tell Trey to go home, he would at least make sure his kit was safe and safest was for the kit to stay put and not to move a muscle unless told otherwise.

"Trey? TREY!" Rocket tried through the helmet radio before remembering that he probably didn't know how to respond to the intercom. "Okay, hang on a moment... You can hear me now? It's not too loud or anything?" Rocket asks fiddling a bit with his kit's suit radio and size adjustments to make it fit better. It would remain as three size too large but Trey would no longer be in danger of "drowning" on it once he was done with the adjusts.

"Yess, daddy. No is fine?" Trey responds almost meekly.

"Good... Because what the FLARK were thinking that you were doing, you moron! You could have got yourself killed you d'ast idget!" Rocket practically roars in all his anger and fear at his son. The kit flinches and recoils in fright, trying in vain to 'escape' the situation by curling into a small ball at his seat.

"I'm sorry daddy, I'm sorry. I'm sorry you hate me now. I'm soryyy!" Trey blubbers eyes wet from tears and Rocket finds it impossible to even try to feel any real anger. Was he suddenly ashamed at yelling for his own child in such a manner? Yes, he was most aware of it. He reaches forwards and unlatches the kit from the seat so he can scoop him up to his lap and starts rocking the kit soothingly against his chest. It was awkward due to space suits and cramped space in the cabin but luckily Trey was small.

"C'mon Trey. Don't cry. It's bad for you when in the suit. Daddy's not hating you. Just got scared a little that's all. hsshh. I'm sorry I yelled at you. I won't do that again."

"Sniff, Promise?" Trey wheezes between a few hiccups and calming down a little.

"Yeah, just... Next time just ask son. Space is really dangerous for kits to go on their own." Rocket says latching Trey back on to his seat.

"I'm sorry daddy." The kit sighs with a low sniff staring at his feet. "You didn't know. Look it's okay." Rocket emphasizes by playfully clacking the kit's helmet with his metal gauntleted claws.

"So, how did you get in here anyway? I thought I'd put the ship on lockdown?" He asks while fiddling with the ships instruments and couple of palm-sized seat mounted G-force dampener units He'd ripped off from the pilot seat. "Don't be angry daddy." Trey pleads.

"No, why would I be. What did you do Trey?" Rocket replies while hooking the Anti-G units into Trey's seat. The kit might be his son but no child could take the full 12 or more G's from a ship like this without sustaining some kind of injury as a result, not even if his son would have had the same cybernetic skeletal system as he did -which his son, thank the Maker, obviously didn't have. The tool chest had a field to keep things stored inside from breaking and subsequently Trey as well as was demonstrated.

"..." The kit opens his mouth but closes it with a snap.

"Trey..." Rocket coaches keeping his voice carefully neutral.

"I watched you... I just wanted to see it one more time and then the door closed and I didn't know what to do and I got tired and hid in the box so you wouldn't get mad at finding me here."

"You watched me... operating the panel and entering the code?" Rocket repeats slowly. Trey nods.

"I didn't mean to. It's not my fault it's just so easy." The kit adds defensively. Rocket blinks for a moment in bewilderment. His 16-digit pass code was Easy to memorize for Trey? EASY! He concentrates his thoughts for a few moments to consider what it might actually mean.

"Okay, ahh look son. I'm not mad okay. Just tell me, Did you actually figure out the code or just recalled it?"

"Recalled. It's easy, mommy doesn't really want to play memory games with us even when she says it's not so and other kits say we cheat. We don't, we're just good at it!" Trey declares putting special stress on the 'not cheating' -part. Rocket had no difficulties in believing his son. Eidetic memory was a natural trait which usually faded with age but in his case it had been genetically enhanced and cybernetically augmented to reach inhuman levels. On hindsight it seemed obvious that his kits would have inherited the trait. What else had they inherited from their father's side? His cyber-tolerance, the so called 'spacer-genes', lightning reflexes? He wasn't sure but hoped that none of that would have to come to play In Trey's life. Most of those 'talents' had only lent him a life of pain and misery. Particularly cyber-tolerance, without it he'd probably had died on the operation table long ago instead of becoming stuffed to the brim with it.

"So how long have you and your brothers had this knack for playing memory games?"

Trey seems to stare at nothing in a fashion that that was almost uncomfortably familiar to Rocket before replying with a question of his own.  "Is that why mommy didn't want to send us to pre-school. Because we're different like you?" A surprisingly sharp question from a kit, Rocket muses.

"I can't say but trust me you're not different Trey, you're extraordinary and don't let anyone think less of you or your siblings for it." Trey seems to think of it for a moment and Rocket is again forced to wonder just how smart were his kids really? Certainly more astute than most in their age group. "I won't daddy." The Kit eventually replies.

"Want to play bit of memory game with daddy?" Rocket asks after a moment of inner debate if a responsible parent would turn any of his kits into ad-hoc combat co-pilot or not. No matter how smart they might seem. "O-okay, daddy." Trey asks somewhat cautiously, sensing that his father was planning on something. "Good. Now look closely as I go through the controls and you repeat their names and functions, pointing at each once I'm done. You following me so far son?"

"Yes, I repeat and point them out."

"Great, here we go. This one is the ignition system. The main sequence works like this when in low gravity..." Rocket starts going through the dials and dashes which Trey then faithfully mimics.

"The last dials here are the automated landing sequencer but you shouldn't use that unless you're sure it's a level surface you are landing on, and that's basically it son. " Rocket finishes with a bit of flourish as his son dutifully repeats Rocket's motions. "Very good, son." Rocket says approvingly and Trey practically beams with pride which makes Rocket smile as well."Did I do good daddy?" Rocket nods with a bit of smile while pushing a few buttons that rearranges the partially holographic controls to be in actual reach of Trey as well. "Excellent my son. Now notice the dash and how I just mirrored it to you. Go ahead fire her up. You can't crash her." Rocket encourages. Trey nods tiny fingers twitching. The kit concentrates carefully before touching any of the dials.  The ship lifts up and stays there, if shakily as was to be expected.

"Okay, this is a good height. Now take the readout and tell me what you think it means..."

Trey's face crunches. "We're floating in the air?"

"All right, that's the basic gist but what we're really doing is that we're being synced with the spin of the planetoid below us but you don't need to worry about that now. I'll explain it better later. Now press that symbol over there, it activates the cloaking device that hides us from our enemies." He instructs. Trey does as told. The only visible change to indicate that it's now on is a blinky yellow light in the dash and the engine pitch changing a fraction. "Alright, looks good. Now give the engines a bit of thrust like so... while using your left paw on the dial to guide the nozzle upwards..." Rocket instructs Trey into leaving the relative safety of the small moon. "Good. Whoops! - not that much." He corrects his son when the ship suddenly jerks forward and Rocket needs to take hold of things.

Once the ship was safely flying in free space at relative low speed, though terribly fast for a fledgling pilot like Trey, the Kit could safely practice steering and Rocket had time to readjust his approach plan on the gate.

"Okay, pass the controls son. Time to do what we came to do here." Rocket bids having made his mental adjustments for his plan.

"Oh daddy, do we have to?" Trey sighs having finally started to enjoy his time as a pilot but obeys after a fashion and passes the controls almost as exactly as Rocket had shown him earlier.

"Well yeah. You do want to get home one day don't cha?" Rocket reminds his son while making sure with his gaze that his son is securely fastened to his seat before taking full control of the ship again. "Right, kiddo. This part's going to be rough so don't be scared okay?"

"I'm not a baby, daddy." Trey huffs folding his arms in manly-man fashion in front of him. Rocket stifles a laughter at the ridiculously "macho" pouting pose his son is holding and steers the ship back towards the black matter gate.

He veered the ship in upward angle from his perspective -space has no true up or down but it was easier to comprehend your position if you thought things as up & down and left & right even in space. He then lunges sharp down to be at 90-degree angle to his previous vector and pushes the throttle in full, rattling anything that isn't bolted down inside the cabin as the tiny craft begins to vibrate like crazy from the sudden violent acceleration. Trey was transfixed to stare ahead, whether from fear or awe. Rocket couldn't say but at least he wasn't about to throw up. _Spacer-genes son._ Rocket thought grimly before concentrating on the mechanical female voice belonging to the ship's AI.

_ten thousand_

_nine thousand_

_eight thousand_

_seven..._

_six.. five_

"Ohh shiitt... Gonna overshoot"

_three thousand!_

"Fucking heell..!"

_one thousand_

_Warning! Proximity danger. Warning!_

_Buoy launched. Buoy approaching target. Target reached._

"Come on you piece of Glark! Turn around you son of a slaag!"

"Ngghh, ughh. C'mon just a little more!!"

 

"Holy flark, let's NOT do that again, like never." Rocket declares teeth still clenched tight to fight off the effects of massive G-forces he had been subjected to just moments ago. It was an effort to even their trajectory and get them away from the Badoon fleet that was suddenly buzzing like a hornets' nest. Getting the ship back into cloak and setting some semblance of a course back to Procyon-6 was easy In comparison. His eyes were blackening and he could feel trembling on his palms and feet slowly climbing up along his arms and legs.

 "Maker's mercy. Not now." Rocket curses. His vision was swimming with black spots and he realized that it may not have been the best idea to strip all the g-force dampeners from his seat to boost Trey's. "Frakk me!... Take the wh-eelll s-son. I-I don't feel too good." Rocket mumbles shakily, slumping forward in his seat harness. "Daddy? Daddy, wake uu-p?!" Is the last frantic cry in his ears before his eyes roll up in his head.

 

* * *

 

It had been two days since Vren Underhill had climbed over the mound and if he wasn't back by noon today they'd be forced to accept their defeat and return back to main group. Food was running low and the nights had been miserable, freezing cold fog that was followed by steaming hot days. In short they were hungry, tired and miserably unhappy lot whose time was running out. Not an ideal situation by any stretch but supposedly it beat being dead or enslaved -if barely. Roork thought sourly and threw another pebble to ricochet from the canyon walls. It having missed the intended target by the barest margin, made from a couple of larger stones set atop one another. "Come on man. Put some effort to it, will ya?" Eir the red sighs throwing his rock dead center of the target. "I hate this stupid fuckin' canyon." Roork declares giving a dour glance at their surroundings while picking some more ammunition from the sandy ground. He stands up stretching his back and walks to Eir, readying to throw another stone. A sudden cry from Tam Two-trees running towards them from their camps direction makes him drop his arm and look at the youngling running towards them. Eir eyes the boy sideways before caching up on him. "Hey, hey, hey kid easy on the draft beasts. What's going on?"

"Underhill, his back -waiting at the camp. Came to get you as fast as I could." Tam replies noticeably winded.

"Did he--?" _Succeed_ was what Roork wanted to say but felt like he would be jinxing it by announcing it aloud. His superstitious purpose was foiled by Tam. "Succeed? I've no idea but there's something... Look, go see for yourself. I ain't going back there on my own, I mean he looks like and sounds like him but I don't know man... Those damn gold eyes alone  are giving me the heebie-jeebs.  "His at the camp?" Eir asks rhetorically, counting his few arrows and testing his survival bow before fading into low brushes that were the stand-ins for vegetation at the boulder dotted canyon. Roork frowns after Eir before starting to walk back to camp with Tam. "Look Tam, nobody has 'gold eyes'. We'll get to bottom of this, maybe his gotten ill or something. Who knows what kind of diseases these damn sand flies are carrying." Roork reassures his shaken compatriot and slaps one of the eponymous flies off of his neck for good measure.

If Roork had had any reservations about anyone having 'golden eyes' There's none now. Vren is sitting on a rock by the unlit fire pit, head down and wearing some kind of brown monk's robe with a deep cowl. Clothes which he certainly wasn't wearing when he'd left two days ago. He raises his head and stands up from the rock when they approach. Roork stops in his tracks at the sight of the two glowing orbs staring from under the cowl. They felt like they were piercing his very soul from under the hood. Tam screams in fright, turning his gaze away. Roork is rooted on the spot staring mesmerized by the golden orbs. He opens his mouth to say something but doesn't know what to say. Roork doesn't so much see than hear what happens next. Eir rising up from his hidey hole somewhere to his left is letting the arrow loose within the same sinuous motion. Roork hears the string 'twap' as the arrow looses from the bow. Vren turns his head a fraction and does a sweeping gesture with his right hand, effortlessly catching the arrow from midflight. Eir gasps audibly but draws another one without a second thought. Vren's eyes seem to focus on Eir and Roork can hear the bow string snapping and Eir cursing coarsely. Tam whimpers. Suddenly the spell or whatever it is that' holding him breaks and Roork stumbles, almost falling, forwards suddenly remembering that he still had a gun at his belt and not just any gun but one of the Guardian-Ranger's flechette guns. Drawing the gun out feels like his swimming in molasses.

"Stop! I don't want to hurt you but I will defend myself if you cannot be made to see reason." Vren announces throwing back his hood to reveal his features and turns his gaze away from them. Suddenly everything around Roork comes rushing back to focus. "The hell just happened." Roork croaks mostly to himself. The half drawn gun drops on the sand forgotten as he tries to figure out what just occurred.

"Does it really matter?" Underhill asks, the glow in his golden yellow eyes slowly dimming. Golden like a bird of prey. Roork ponders, slowly picking his gun from the sand. He had no doubt it was only because Underhill had allowed it. "Well, duh. It sure as day matters when some golden eyed freak starts showing off with his powers.!" Eir huffs disgruntled. "Eir!" Roork scolds. "Let him speak his mind. Truth to tell I'm not yet fully comfortable with this change either." Underhill says rising his hand to still anything further Roork or Eir might have wanted to say on the matter. Roork doesn't mind that and apparently neither does Eir who with a quiet huff sets to fix his bow string while Tam closes their camp with Underhill's quiet assistance.

"So what now? We go back home or-?" Tam pipes up having recovered some of his nerves. "It is what we should do." Vren agrees almost surprisingly soothingly.

"Only if you agree to be medically examined once we get back to base camp Underhill." Roork stipulates sternly. "If it puts your mind at ease though I assure you it's not a disease that colors my eyes." Vren shrugs pulling the thick cowl back over his head despite the rising noon heat. "My newly opened eyes have yet to lose their sensitiveness to bright light." He comments cryptically when his compatriots throw questioning gazes at his direction. "Sunglasses would have been less conspicuous than crazy cultist cowl, just saying." Eir remarks sarcastically. "I wasn't there for the fashion tips, besides they had run out on sunglasses." Vren replies equally spiky. "Just knock it off." Roork sighs willing those two to rather concentrate on putting one foot before the other instead of pointless bickering.

* * *

 

The trio raised more than a few eyebrows climbing up the cliff face to the base camp. Mostly Underhill and his cowl though there were hushed murmurs about Arik Lowlander missing.

"I see you found... something?" Doc Greyle comments with a frown when Roork ushers Vren into his tent.

"You might say that." He says. "Show him." Roork grunts poking at Vren with his elbow standing mutely beside him. Vren gives the man a tired look before pulling the cowl back. Doc Greyle's eyebrows climb at little at the sight of the now pale golden yellow irises but his too professional to openly freak out and just grabs a medical  examining light from his bag to shine the light on Vren's eyes for pupil dilation check.

"Well, I have to say this; while I've never seen anything like this but if it's some kind of illness, please can I have an infection of whatever it is that his having because he seems healthy enough to be put in front of a plough. In fact I'm pretty sure his in better health than he was when we came here."

Greyle concludes putting away his stethoscope and other examining tools while Vren redoes his robe and cowl. "Apart from my eyes, I suppose" Vren adds to Doc's statement. "We'll see in a few days if the sensitivity doesn't abate." Greyle says unconcerned. "Well that's great. My advice; healthy or not, keep the damn cowl up and 'powers' to yourself. You're freaking people out with those golden eyes enough as it is." Roork grumbles sounding somewhat unhappy. "I won't be able to hide myself for long, I fear. Weapon unused is a weapon wasted." Underhill's statement makes Greyle's face crunch in concern and Shade water's twist in worry. "Well, try not to 'weaponize' yourself prematurely." Roork grumbles leaving Greyle alone in the tent with Vren.

"I can't blame him for mistrust. I'm still new to this and struggle to contain my powers." Vren admits confidentially. Greyle shakes his head in denial. "Boy, don't do this to yourself. You're a man, a young man with his whole life ahead of him, get a wife, have kids -once we've rid of those lizards of course. You're not a weapon to be used and then discarded. Don't waste it thinking yourself as a martyr destined to die."

"Perhaps so but since you're my Doc I see no reason to keep it from you... Part of the 'price' was infertility though I was also assured that I'd have greatly expanded longevity ahead of me to offset it." Vren assents and pulls the cowl back over his head before walking out to find Roork. "It's not enough sonny, To merely live a long life, it never is." Greyle sighs to himself and starts packing his tent. They would leave soon now that the explorers were back.

* * *

 

"Is that-?" Roork, sitting at the front seat in the lead car lowers his binoculars to ask from the driver Greyle who frowns a bit. "Looks like a check point to me. Are we stopping?" He inquires glancing at his leader. "Yeah, let's move in a bit closer. I'll call the fleet. Pull over on the side behind that bend just before the checkpoint. We'll walk rest of the way to check it out. I don't like the looks of the place." Roork says and grabs the walkie-talkie from the dash. The check point at the end of the serpentine road along the low hillsides seemed like it had been built in haste and then pretty much abandoned. In fact the whole countryside had felt strangely quiet for the past two days they'd been driving back to east.

"All right people. There's a check point just behind the bend. Me, Eir and Underhill are going to go in and see what we can learn from the situation at the front. Everyone okay with this?" Nobody objected. "Right, we take  full gear guys. We don' know what's in there." Roork orders with a nod. "Where's your gun Vren?" He asks with a frown, noticing his empty hands where as everyone else is carrying guns. "I only need this" Vren shrugs revealing the photon sword's handle hanging from his belt. "Suit yourself." Roork had decided not to touch those things. They looked fucking lethal -to their users. He checked his ripper pistol and gave the go order.

They studied the small trailer hut for good five to ten minutes before Roork came to conclusion that there was nobody there and that it wasn't some kind of trap.

"The place is deserted but nobody's even touched let alone looted it yet." Roork comments once the trio has searched the trailer surroundings for the missing guardsmen who should logically be there. "I don't think they've been gone for longer than a day." Eir comments, cautiously sniffing at the leftovers in the pot at the stove. "They've given up, these men here and the radio's dead." Vren remarks vaguely while observing the scenery through the trailer window. "I just know." he says when Roork is about to ask how.

"Hey boss, I found a map. The next town or more like a village holding troops is Kampoor just a few miles east, maybe they can tell us what's happened during the week?" Eir holler's from the tiny kitchen waving a tattered military atlas.

Kampoor wasn't a even a town it was barely even a village with perhaps two dozen houses lined along both sides of  one single unpaved road leading through it. the mostly wooden township was surrounded by sparse forestland and wide stretches of pasture. The few People to be seen were hurriedly latching their possession on their cars and trailers.

Their small motorcade is being slowed by a farmer hauling all he owns in a tractor. Greyle drives the car on its side for Roork to peek his head out of the window to speak with the driver. "Hey wait up, slow down old man! What's happening here? Where are you all going? Where's the police, the army, anyone?"

"Coppers are gone fightin' an' gatherin' over yonder with dem military and were gittin' Away, nary a place safe left but surely better be away from here! The gibberlings are coming, I love our bois but dem gibbers 'r darn well unstoppable. Don't think our bois gonna handle' em, nope, no siree!" The elderly driver carrying a hunting rifle waves with his hand while chatting away with his thick midland accent.

"Gibberlings- The heck are those? Drive on Greyle, there's supposedly some kind front post just beyond the village." Roork says with a confused frown, pulling his head back in as Greyle speeds them forward passing the tractor. "I dunno but I don't like where this is going." Greyle shrugs equally mystified.

They've barely reached out of sighting distance from the village when the first or perhaps last of the soldiers come running past them. Some even throwing their weapons and other gear away. Greyle stops the car by the roadside and everyone mounts out with their guns ready. Gunfire is slowly becoming closer but in their trained ears it's clearly sporadic and unorganized. Roork stops one of the fleeing soldiers rushing by, by grabbing him to his side by the collar. The strange incessant chittering sound in the air was getting stronger by the minute.

"What's happening. Where's the rest of your platoon?" He yells hoping to get an answer from the quivering man. "All I know is that the next thing coming after me down that hill is going to be hungry and speaking gibberish! Look, there's too many of them. We can't hold them. Nobody can." He starts running again as soon as Roork let's go off the man. "Shouldn't we kinda scram too?" Tam asks worriedly.

"No. This is why I went to the temple of the Kings." Underhill shakes his head and lights his photon sword with a low ominous hiss and begins to trot toward the high but gently sloped ridge which was blocking their view from the actual battle being fought at the fields beyond it. "You heard him." Roork announces starting to follow behind Vren but stops at the crest of the ridge.

"So those are gibberlings." Roork mutters surveying the battle from afar at their vantage point. "I think Zom's a more scientific sounding." Greyle grumbles clutching at his assault rifle. "Oh man that's a lot of Zoms..." Eir sighs seeing the remains of their army in full panicked retreat or fighting in small knots of men and thousands upon thousands of former citizens -now turned to Zoms, charging forward like a brown mass across the field. Roork realizes the situation for what it is -hopeless but this doesn't seem to have dawned to Vren or perhaps the young raccoonoid truly had nothing to fear seeing how his stride hadn't faltered even the slightest. In fact he seemed ready to face the horde head-on.

The lone cloaked figure faced the gibbering mass, becoming engulfed by it like a toy buried under the crashing wave of half rotten corpses surging forward. "well, so much for that. I think we'd better..." Roork sighs turning to flee, not wanting to see or repeat what just happened to Vren. Eir grabs his arm forcing him to turn around. "Wait, look! Something is happening."

It seemed to Roork as if a bubble had risen on the surface of that sea of putrid brown and grey. Slowly at first but with increasing speed it begun to move and grind a zigzag path through the 'sea' of bodies. "Holy Molly!" someone squeaks and Roork has to agree that seeing but a one man just carving his way through thousands is as terrifying as its elating. The fleeing soldiers stop their retreat and one by one stop and turn, and they're turning back to fight. They were rallying. Rallying behind the one man who alone would dare to face the gibbering hordes of the Badoon Zoms.

"Well boys. You wanted to get some payback on the lizards." Roork says hoisting his gun to signal them forward with a grin. His group wouldn't be facing these new Zoms, their job would be to strike and eliminate their leaders.

 

Roork tried his best to ignore the putrid stench of coppery blood and rotting flesh combined now hanging over the battlefield. A gun went off somewhere in the background. He tried not to wince every time it happened despite knowing what the sound meant. He stepped gingerly between mutilated bodies to avoid stepping on any spilt entrails making his way towards the brown robed figure sitting still at the middle of the carnage.

"You alright Vren?" He asks cautiously, unsure of the young man's current mental state. Vren turns to scowl at Roork his golden eyes burning bright like twin suns from under the deep hood. Vren blinks his eyes causing the twin suns to flicker nervously before answering."No, not really. Those poor creatures -they're not truly dead you know. I-I could feel their minds, feel their gratitude, gratitude for the end to their pain. How could anyone do this to another being? Force them to exist between life and death like this." Roork gazed at the thousands that Vren had hacked to pieces with his ray sword that were laying around them on the grass and suppressed a shiver. "Because our enemy has no regard for lives other than their own." He finally replies. And it's not for the first nor the last time for him ponder the meaningfulness of it all, both life and death.

 

* * *

 

 

Poor Trey, barely old enough to go to school and already forced to take the tasks which most adults couldn't have handled. His father, whom he'd barely even known to exist only a few weeks earlier, was leaning boneless against his seat harness and likely unconscious. He didn't know what was wrong with his daddy and it scared him, scared him almost even more than the explosions getting closer to hit them with every salvo that rocked the small spacecraft or the fate of his mommy and baby brothers. Perhaps it was a good thing that Trey was too young to even imagine all the bad things that realistically could've happened to her and his brothers. He missed them, he missed home and his friends. He just wanted to go home and felt a tear leak from his eyes. He tried to wipe it but forgot that his helmet's visor was in the way. He had to let it irate. He wished he was bigger so he could properly see outside and get a better idea of what was happening and where they were going. He hoped he was doing good with avoiding the explosions by trying to steer the ship this way and that while still going relatively straight line towards the bluish marble closing in slowly, though the ship seemed to respond differently from what it had when daddy had let him fly a bit.

It took Trey a minute or two to realize that the big ball they were heading to was a planet. Another shot rocked the ship and this time even Trey knew it was a bad hit.

_Malfunction. Autopilot disengaging. Pilot attention required._

The feminine voice announced but Trey had no idea what it had just said -the ship's computer used Xandarian. He only realized that the controls were suddenly his because the ship started to spin wildly around its axis until he clutched the controls and closed his eyes for a second to recall how daddy had shown him what to do if it happened and the ship righted, if barely.

Had Rocket been conscious he could have told Trey that the Badoon likely wanted them alive for questioning and had in fact forced their ship to land but Trey had no knowledge of such things and blithely assumed that they'd given up on the chase since they were no longer being fired upon and did as he'd been taught when certain symbols appeared on the screen in front of him, in order to have their ship automatically home in and land on preset coordinates.

* * *

 

Trey was terrified. Their ruined ship was on fire and had been almost from the minute they'd successfully crash landed.

A group of lizard men had been waiting and snatched them out off the burning ship. They'd poked his daddy but figured to deal with him later because he was still unconscious. The Badoon had slammed him down to lay against a tree base, momentarily forgotten while concentrating on Trey since he was not unconscious. Trey would have tried to run if his legs hadn't been injured. At best he could only crawl. This seemed to amuse the Badoon greatly.

" Zoook bak reee!" One of them said poking at Trey with his weapon and barked something to its two fellows and they all croaked heartily together. Trey assumed it was them laughing. He tried his best to suppress his whelps and wished he'd had a gun too but mommy had been strict with not letting him or his brothers near them.

"Zoook bak joorde?" One of the lizards barked and another one raised its gun at Trey, ready to shoot him. "Bgaak ur Joorde? drook glooo igbuoo gjaak oo."  The one on the right harrumphed in response. Trey tried to crawl away. The gun made a small whining noise as it spooled and Trey closed his eyes whimpering in terror.

 

Rocket felt himself wake when hitting against something hard. He was still aching but the episodic pain had ebbed for now. He blinked trying to get an idea of what was happening. "Zoook bak reee!" _let's make the little shit dance!_ someone yelled in the guttural Badoon and he could hear through his helmet intercom that Trey was crying. he wanted to kill his son's tormentors -with bare hands if necessary.

He felt his guns in their holsters at his side. Good thing the fuckers hadn't thought of taking them away yet.

 _"_ Zoook bak joorde?" _How about making a slave out of it?_ One of them was asking next and Rocket took his pistol into both of his trembling paws to keep it steady.

"Bgaak ur Joorde? drook glooo igbuoo gjaak oo." _What for? it's a broken slave. Just kill it already so we can eat. I'm starving here._

Rocket raised his gun and shot the one threatening his son with a gun first -through the back of its head. The Badoon's companions turned to look at Rocket but before they could react again he'd shot the one at his right after shooting it twice -first in the arm and them in the lower torso. The one at his left dashed behind a tree and went on doing blind potshots at Rocket which went off by a mile because he was so short. Rocket responded by shooting the whole clip until he finally managed to steady his aim enough to actually shoot the Badoon's kneecap off that was peeking out from behind the tree trunk, forcing him to fall more into open at which point it was easy for Rocket to put his last plasma rounds through its body.

Rocket let his gun hand drop. His vision was swimming again but he knew he'd need to get up. They couldn't stay here. The Badoon would send a larger group once these three would be noticed missing.

He staggered but eventually rose up by leaning against the tree for support. "Son, you all right. They didn't hurt you, did they?" He asks through the helmet intercom. "No daddy. I'm fine." Trey lies bravely and starts crawling on his belly towards his father. Rocket sighed inwardly. His son may be physically fine but mentally... No kit should be forced through this mangle they'd been at. He meets his son at halfway and lifts his and his son's helmet visors up to touch his nose with his son's as a sign of affection and scoops his son to sit at his shoulder. Rocket could walk faster even when burdened and barely functioning with Trey on his shoulders in comparison to having his kit using crutches.

 

It would be morning soon and the smoke from the burning ship would be seen for miles. They'd have maybe half an hour left to run as far as they could from the crash site. No time and not much point to salvage anything from the wreck except a plasma riffle and ammunition from the dead Badoons.

* * *

 

Rocket's legs were just burning after the ten mile hike but he had had an idea where they were going al along. Just a few more miles and they should be arriving to where he was originally supposed to land when he'd came to Procyon-6. He sagged a little and finally dropped onto his knees to catch his breath. Their goal, a radio station that hosted a giant radio telescope -one of the largest in the planet. Its masts were already peeking from behind the tree line. He gulps for air. "Think you can do just a few more miles son?"

"Okay, daddy" the kit replies passively. Trey might have just sat on Rocket's shoulders the whole way but he still felt as tired as he'd been if he'd walked the distance himself. At least they had air-conditioned suits on to make the sweltering mid day heat bearable.

That the station was bombed and ruined was no surprise to Rocket who knew how the Badoon operated. Though the giant concrete disc on the ground had bomb holes through it, the station itself was intact enough to offer them enough shelter for the day. Rocket practically drops Trey on the ground once they're inside and sags against the bare concrete walls to find spot to lay down for the time being. He reaches his hand out to remove the medicine case from his left thigh. Even in the dim light of the interior there was no mistaking about how much his hands were trembling. Luckily the ampoules and the dispenser inside the case were still intact.

His hands were shaking enough to turn even the simplest of task of pulling up a sleeve and filling an automated syringe into an exercise in marksmanship. His whole body shook so badly now but he needed a shot. Needed the shot to stop the tremors. Again the syringe dropped from his trembling hands and the ampoule followed. He watched it roll across the concrete floor to a stop against a chair leg. He looked at his trembling paws and felt so useless. How could he keep his son safe if he couldn't even medicate himself anymore? He buried his face into his arms. He wouldn't cry, wouldn't ask help, it was not how he'd been conditioned to behave. A tiny paw grabbed his arm pulling him to look at his son. Trey said nothing but in his eyes was compassion, no pity or obligation just compassion. He silently offered the phial to his father who took it equally wordless and again tried to place it into syringe but this time tiny child's paws grabbed the larger adults paws, steadied and guided them just enough for him to draw the needed amount and then helped him to hit the vein in his arm. Relief surged through him. He felt himself sliding down against the wall and to lay on the hard floor. It didn't matter, it wasn't important, the pain was gone, the muscle tremors were gone -for now.


	12. Chapter 12 -Taking action.

##  **Chapter 12**

##  **Taking action.**

 

 

Rocket looks curiously around him. The landscape was ephemeral, dream-like even. He was fairly certain now that he was dreaming and off-hand wondered who could be such a powerful telepath to reach him even here at Procyon-6. None that he knew as a friend possessed such power. The gentle mists slowly part in front of him as he sojourns along the smooth garden path. The mist clears enough at the end of the path to reveal a rather simple pavilion. A figure robed in coarse brown monk's robes is sitting by the table set to the pavilion. Rocket looks at his own clothing and realizes with some curiosity how he himself is wearing what was currently quite fashionable at Xandar, fairly simple dark shirt, a smart vest ((guaranteed to keep you nice and cool on hot days, warm at cold while also answering your calls and arranging your almanac -tax returns-form app coming up next fall)) and pale short hemmed jacket with loose black trousers and sandal like Zori-shoes.

"Why am I here Underhill?" Rocket asks curtly from the golden eyed figure at the table. He'd seen glowy eyes before. They were nothing special to him who had in his time travelled almost literally from one corner of the universe to the next. He already pretty much guessed from where Vren Underhill had gotten his new and sudden Telepathic skill set and felt it mostly redundant to even comment on it.

"I have news Guardian-Ranger. Have a seat." The figure replies waving towards a chair by the table. Rocket nods stiffly and sits down opposite the hooded figure.

"Okay, well I hope this won't take long... I've got to wake up in a few hours or Trey's going freak up if I don't."

"Ahh, don't worry I won't keep you long. The news; first of all you were right. The Badoon have begun to use Thermobaric bombs -they utterly decimated one of our newly outfitted divisions at Olzaba forest, causing us to lose what little control we had regained on that region. We've also  gained a small victory against the Zom-troops near the village of Kampoor."

"Not much you can do against those Underhill. I told you to avoid direct engagements, they can't hit what they can't see... There are worse weapons of mass destruction than thermobaric bombs in the Badoon arsenal. Thermobaric Bombs just kill... Those others... There are chemicals  -aerosols mainly, which the Badoon would have already used if they had only wanted to decimate this planet. In fact had they wished to use them, only two kinds of people might be alive in this planet right now. People like me because of my cybernetic chemical warfare mods and probably those like you due to... changes done to you and still both of us would be envying the dead." Rocket says and draws a shuddering breath and Vren doesn't need his psychic abilities to realize that Rocket doesn't wish speak of it further quite possibly due to personal experiences. Rocket then inhales sharply, continuing "-And by the way congratulations about finding what you needed if maybe not what you might have expected." Rocket fells silent his body language insinuating his wish to change the subject. He knew pretty well what a thermobaric bombs and nerve gases could do, he'd seen it done and once to a whole planet -bad things... best not to think of it too much or you'd never sleep well again. Vren lowers his head a fraction in acquiescence.

"Yet you do not seem surprised that I'm capable of this." Vren remarks contemplatively. Rocket snorts dismissively. "I've seen things to cool your blood for life in my travels through the Galaxy, ohh King of Kings... A teep with golden yellow eyes is positively tame to me."

"I have a an advice to ask from you as well... when I found the Temple of the Kings and became the king of kings-." Vren says ignoring Rocket's light verbal jab.

"Okay... Well, spit it out boy, you may be a mind reader but I'm not."

"I do not read minds if I can avoid it, such breach of privacy makes me _uneasy_ on the inside. Anyway -I seem to have gained a following. What should I do with people who've started a cult to follow me?"

"Why, are they causing you trouble?"

"No, but I fear that they'll get themselves killed or do something that I don't want, in my name." Rocket nods in understanding.

"Device a testing and only accept the ones that pass to be your 'true disciples" but most of all keep the most mentally suitable. Physical incompatibility can usually be fixed with training and exercise but mentally incompatible is usually a lost cause. Regard each of your recruits like your own children and they'll follow you even when they shouldn't and treat them as if they were your own flesh and blood and they'll follow you even on to death... But don't overdo it. Be fair but stern and don't forget to train them properly. You're going to need 'elite troops' later to police and keep order because the Badoon won't be here forever and there will be changes, big changes, once they leave - and big change always brings unrest. Coming of the Badoon has rattled what you Procyonians think as 'normal' and you can't turn back the clock and pretend it never happened." Rocket extrapolates in part from Nova corps field guide and part from his own experiences as a mercenary and lawman.

Vren nods at the advice thinking on it. "What of you, I sense you're not in space anymore?" He asks after a moment of mutual silence.

"I completed the mission and sent the buoy. The Badoon have shot my ship down. I'm at an old Radio telescope mountain right now. If I'm right in my calculations, a Nova relief force should arrive within days and once they do and get rid of that Badoon fleet hanging over us... You'll need to be ready to wipe their filthy slave camps from the map. Avoid major offensives until then."

"Should I send someone for you to pick you up?"

"Don't bother. They wouldn't get here in time even if I'd need them."

"Understood. The Maker's mercy befall on you Guardian-Ranger." Vren says giving a respectful nod.

"Mercy. Never had me none, never gave it and never will need it." Rocket scoffs as the dreamscape begins to fade away.

**

"Daddy, I'm hungry." Trey whines poking Rocket on the side to wake him up. It was still dark though the rising sun was already beginning to russet the skyline despite the low drizzle. Rocket yawned widely, casting his bleary eyes on Trey. The kit seemed tired and his ears were drooping unhappily. The originally white emergency EVA- spacesuit was  already more grey and brown than white from Trey having to use his hands rather than feet to move around. That model of EVA-suits by Pancor-corporation wasn't designed to be used for extended periods of time and ill-suited for terrestrial activities. Rocket's own suit was designed to be worn for weeks at a time without the need to clean it in-between where as Trey's was already getting that faint smell of sour & grungy.

"I know son. C'mon let's get you off this suit already." Rocket sighs starting to peel Trey from his suit and felt the pangs of hunger as well. He dug into his pockets to find just one lousy and slightly mashed up food bar, that had basically been forgotten in the belt pocket, to give for Trey.

"Here son, It's what I've got left." Rocket sighs breaking the bar by giving two thirds to Trey and eating a third himself. Trey sniffs cautiously at the chocolate brown bar and its wrappers before taking a hungry bite after a careful nibble. "Is this space food?" The kit asks while playing with the wrappers.

"Yeah, pretty much. In space you have to travel light and making food into bars like that allows you to take more with you for long voyages." Trey nods to the explanation. "Can I have some water too daddy?" He asks next. "Sure son. Give me a moment and I'll go fetch you some. Wait here." Rocket promises piling Trey's suit away into corner and considered leaving his helmet off as well. He shouldn't really need its protection or Radio right now.

It didn't take too long for Rocket to find a bowl suitable for collecting some of the rain water dripping down from the eaves. In the low drizzle the bomb shelled Station grounds seemed even more forlorn than it had at last evening when they'd arrived. He stood there for a moment in perfect silence, letting his helmet's sophisticated sensory arrays to do the work for him while waiting for the bowl to fill with water fresh enough for drinking. Satisfied that no sounds of engines was caught and that enemy radio frequencies had nothing but static, Rocket returns back inside with the full bowl. He considered making a fire to boil the water but decided against it in case of the smoke drawing unwanted attention, dropping a purification tablet on the bowl instead, before offering it to Trey. Not that they had anything to cook for food anyway... All the more reasons to search the place for the original transmission and hike back to civilization. Sooner or later the Badoon would widen their search area and he intended to be gone before then. But first he'd need to do a bit of scavenging to give some much needed oomph to the basic Badoon war riffles he'd taken earlier. The digging around the station logs for the message was mostly aimed to sate his curiosity and to find a few parts.

At the radio room on the second story Rocket found what he was really craving for. Never mind the radio equipment, parts or message logs. A full bottle of rum. He smacked his lips in delight, corked the bottle, took the ear muffs to listen on the logged radio messages and took a long sip and set down to tinker with the guns and equipment while becoming steadily inebriated.

_-Please anyone!- They're coming-for god's sake!-_

_-Please, anybody. They're coming!-Coming!-help us!-_

_..._

_-My friend, Rafi- he's got...lifeless eyes, black eyes, like a doll's eye. He got bit yesterday and now... When he comes at ya, doesn't seem to be livin'. Until he bites ya and those black eyes roll over white. And then, and then you hear that terrible high pitch screamin' and the ocean turns red and spite of all the poundin' and the hollerin' they all come in and rip you to pieces. -His not my friend anymore-_

_-and I woke up... On Rafi's feverish struggles_

_-I've taken to lock him up in the basement..._

_..._

_-I don't know how he got out, maker's mercy, I've taken to keep my room locked up._

_-His called them and they're here,-So many-_

_-I can hear their eerie howlin..._

_-gibbering howls, -beasts calling their kindred across the lone night_

_-Why am I still here? Why am I trying to keep sending this stupid message? Is there anyone up there listening?-_

_..._

Rocket stops the tape, counting. If he placed the time of this message right on the timeframe of events, it would mean that the Dark energy portal distorts space time in its vicinity, possibly moving things shortly through time -relatively, possibly a week or more. Going out from Procyon's system through it would be going backwards and coming in was forward. That could mean that his message buoy had been out for days already in the Galactic median time and the Guardians could be here much sooner than he'd anticipated. If this was a normal feature of dark energy... It would certainly explain the Shi'ar reluctance to even mention of it to anyone who wasn't a fellow Shi'ar with high security clearance. D'ast but he needed a drink.

* * *

 Vren was not hard to find. He'd changed perhaps more than the lad would care to admit. Roork though climbing up the low hillside to find the young Raccoonoid staring at the night sky. The golden eyed  youngster turns to look at his elder when he approaches.

"You heard what happened at Olzaba?" Roork asks carefully. "Yes, I saw the reports. I don't know, if we could have somehow..." Vren starts wringing his palms in the concerned washing pattern familiar to all Raccoonoids. "Don't say it mate. Thermobaric bombs delivered down from orbit -just like the Guardian Ranger had warned us about. We could've only died in that field with them..." Roork sighs trying to figure out what it was that Vren was staring at in the horizon. "You don't understand, Roork. Nobody does. I could feel them dying, even from here. The living -for the few minutes that they had left after the bombs hit, were envying the dead in their final thoughts as their destroyed lungs slowly expired..." Roork blinked at Vren's statement. "You could feel them -from another effin' continent?"

"I am the king of kings, Roork. I can feel each of my subjects life beginning as well as ending as their conscience joins and leaves me... I was very distraught about it at first but they're just pinpricks now and easy enough to ignore when I choose to but not on this scale. So my mind was drawn, drawn like a moth to a flame to witness it." Vren explains drawing a shuddering breath. Roork could only nod in sympathy and felt strangely lucky for not being the one to have gone to the Temple. "If it's any consolation to you, the High command has issued an order; that for the time being we're to avoid any pitched and large scale battles. We have no defence against Thermobaric bombing and the Badoon don't seem to even care if they lose a few of their own in the process." He informs bleakly.

"It's not, but thanks for sharing. The High command do not trust me with much anymore." Vren grimaces slightly.

"On another news. You're starting to gather a following." Roork says deciding on changing the subject.

"News travel fast even now. I've seen a few already. Wearing brown robes and refusing to use anything but simple hand-to-hand weapons if they can't get their hands on ray swords." Vren nods closing his eyes for awhile, concentrating on something which only he could perceive. Roork felt it best to not interrupt it with his banter and stays silent waiting for him to finish it.

"They're beginning to gather here now, Roork. I've also spoken with the Halfworlder and he agrees on what to do with my followers..." Vren explains opening his eyes that had started to shine intensely golden. "You do?" Roork says uncertain.

"Yes, come with me. I am going to need a good lieutenant at my side when I whip them into shape." Vren says starting to walk back down the hillside to their camp at its base. 'Uh-huh' Roork huffs in response.

* * *

It was early morning or maybe it was night when the message was received at the Guardians home ship. Peter had never been fully sure how to call these odd hours when at space. The times when you were feeling tired and just felt like going to bed before you'd keel over but you still had at least an hour to go with your shift at the helm. He drowsily takes a sip of his Xandarian coffee and almost chokes on the hot mouthful when the console unexpectedly beeps implying a message incoming. Peter wipes his mouth clean, pushing a few buttons on the comm-console to receive & record it. The holo-vid pops into small dashboard display which Peter quickly transfers to larger display and hits 'play' folding his hands behind his neck while lounging at the chair. His leisure pose turns into one of rapt attention when Rocket,- in space, at his ship pops into view. At the start of the vid Rocket glances to his right and is pointing at something to his co-pilot at the co-pilot's dash which Quill can't see due to fixed angle of the holo-cam. Quill assumes it is mounted to the dash in front of Rocket. -Rocket then apparently gives some kind of instructions in some unknown language that had a peculiar chittering accent or rather a quality to it. A language which Quill's translator implant can't translate. Someone acknowledges the instructions in that same unknown language that Quill's translator still can't make heads or tails out off. Though after listening a play-through of the short banter for the third time, he was pondering on how the tone made him think that the reply may have belonged to a child. Was Rocket teaching local kids to fly? On the Holo-Vid Rocket turns his attention back to finishing with recording his message. Quill fast-forwards it a little to get to the actual message portion.

-"Hey Quill, when you get this message I might already be kinda dead or close enough anyway that it'll make no difference to me. So I'm only going to say this mushy-wushy touchy-feely crappy shit once..." Rocket explains becoming more serious in tone as the video progresses. At the end of the message Peter 'Star-lord' Quill is cursing coarsely and loudly enough to surprise even his team mates.

Peter replays the message to his companions who each have their own 'take' on it. Gamora looks like she's had a breakfast of stones while muttering 'figured it' under her breath. "Time to bust out the body bags!"Drax grins widely and smacks his palms together loudly. It was no secret that Drax had issues with spending his 'downtime' outside combat hours. Groot is suspiciously muted prompting Quill to frown a little at his wooden companion. "You knew about this didn't you?" to which Groot shrugs as if implying to say "And what were you going to do about it even if I'd told you?" Quill gets up from the chair and stretches his back after sitting in the chair for hours before turning to look at his team mates. "You want to call this crisis to Nova corps Gamora? I've done the call thrice this month already."

"Didn't know we were counting Peter Quill." She notes wryly. "Figured they might be bored with my face by now... Besides with eye bags like these they might confuse me with Rocket." Peter quips yawning loudly and leaves Gamora to handle the message while he went to get some much needed shut-eye. It would probably take at least 12 hours for Nova corps to mobilize a force big enough to be of any use for this 'Procyon-6'. What a strange name. It tickled something at the back of Peter's mind. probably a Terran word association like the living planet Ego which coincidentally had a huge ego even though the name translated to something wildly different in galactic common.

* * *

Rocket wakes up from his drunken stupor and blinks groggily, spending precious seconds to figure out what's going on and what time it was. "Yeah, yeah, I'm awake. You can stop yelling on my ear now Trey."

Trey's palpable gratefulness at the other end of the comm-link is enough to electrify Rocket that something was very wrong even before Trey could explain himself.

"Daddy, daddy! Lizards, hundred, -thousand even, coming up the hill. What are we going to do daddy?" Rocket shook his head a little to clear his head. He hadn't meant to drink enough from the bottle to get drunk, It was all his fault that they were still here when the Badoon came calling. He gave it a moment of thought.

"Right son. Now listen carefully, have the Badoon seen you yet?" Rocket asks peeking out from the window to verify his son's words himself. Those were indeed Badoon he saw, not merely Zoms but luckily it was just a patrol and not a full assault squad. Trey seemed to think his words for a moment before his reply which was a scared; --No he didn't think they had seen him yet.

"Okay, good. Now put the rest of your suit on -don't argue, I know it smells funny now, and crawl into closet or cabin to hide and stay there until I tell you otherwise and under no circumstance are you to open your helmet  visor or take any part of the suit off, you understand? Good." Rocket instructs sternly and goes to town with the various cleaning, household and maintenance chemicals he'd found on one of the cleaning closets while checking out the second floor. The chlorate detergents and pipe cleaner would be particularly useful, he thought grimly and started to mix them up just so in empty glass jars and bottles that were laying about. Rocket was secretly glad that the staff of the place hadn't been exactly neat freaks thus leaving him with plenty of useful scrap to use in 'home defence'.

Trey could hear them coming. The heavy clanking footsteps from many pairs of metallic heels hitting on the concrete floor. Guttural voices speaking in the alien language of the Badoon. Furniture being moved around, searching. He stifled a scared whimper when the steps came closer and stopped just in front of the cabinet closet he was hiding in. Suddenly there was the sound of glass breaking, guttural screaming, the hissing sounds of laser fire, more yelling, bodies hitting the floor and then... Strange drumming sounds, sounds as if someone was striking their heels repeatedly against the floor. Thumping of heels is then replaced by dragging sounds, as if something was being pulled across the concrete floor and then it became deathly quiet except for the sounds of door slamming. Trey waited and waited too afraid to move even a muscle. He nearly jumped out from his skin when his father's voice spoke through the comm-link. "It's alright now son. You can come out now."

And Trey very carefully opened the door of the cabinet he was hiding in. The foyer room was a mess, even more than it had been before. Broken glass was now littering the floor and strange unhealthy looking yellowish brown miasma still clung about. His father seemed mostly uncaring about it. Trey couldn't see the bodies of the Badoon but he was a smart kit and quickly figured it all out from the laser scorches and long drag marks on the floor leading away from the house. He glances at his father, who seemed engrossed at inspecting his enormous Frankenstein of a gun and then at something dangling from a chain at his free paw that vaguely looked like a keychain. Trey says nothing waiting for his father to make the decision. Rocket looks up from the key chain at the room and then smirks at his kit. "We're going for a wild ride son." But the hangman's grin on his father's face is bereft of joy.


	13. Ch 13

## Ch13

## Fighting chance

 

It was raining -again, as was common at this time of the year, though without access to calendar Nidnene had only vague idea of what month they were in anymore. Wake up, line-up, go out and eat, line up for work inspection and return to the pits, work at the pits until sundown, return to barracks. That was her routine now, hers and Danine's and everyone else's. Even though Danine was now obviously sick the Lizards didn't really care since she still looked hale enough to walk and work. Nidnene worried how long they could keep up appearances by using ad hoc pigments, broom bristles and hair donated by other prisoners to disguise her failing health and the widening bald patches in her coat. Even though Nidnene was trying to work for both to fool the lizards and give her time to bounce back, they both acknowledged that the gig would be up soon and the Butcher's bill was due for collect.

"Drom vo-laaak usgra!" _Come here she-work slave!"_ comes the dreaded guttural cry. Danine, shivering against the edge of the pit wall, looked up at Nidnene in terror. Nidnene looked back at her without stopping her shoveling of dirt into the automated mining cart and they both knew it was time to act or perish. The Guard, apparently annoyed that Danine wasn't responding, lowered down via ladders to the pit. He grabbed Danine by the chest furs, turning his back to Nidnene standing behind him with her shovel poised. The guard fixed his gaze on Danine shivering under his foot, and then examined the fistful of "hair" he had pulled out with suspicious ease.

Nidnene barely even hesitated when she jumped up on the cart to get higher and brought the sharp edge of the shovel against the Guard's neck in a wild horizontal arc. The blow nearly decapitated the Guard with one fell strike -shovel hitting just so into the thin seam between the neck plate and helmet. The guard crashed down to the earth behind the mining cart, giving out no more protest than a single low agonized gurgle.

"On my Makers word, Nidnene. I-I think you killed him. We're so dead now!" Danine squeaks both terrified and elated.

"Can it Danine. In case you haven't noticed the Makers have decided to sit this one out a long time ago. So, shut up and hide that gun away. We've a date with destiny." Nidnene pointed grimly. She hadn't planned it to go like this, in fact she had barely planned anything solid and yet was suddenly trusted with a chance to strike back and get even with their captors. She glanced around shiftily and let out a sigh of relief when it seemed that neither the guards at the rim or slaves laboring further down at the terraced pit slopes had yet noticed her deed. a faint thunder clapped in the distance- a herald for more rain.

"You can't hide that bigger gun inside your clothes, they would notice the bulk -even without the stuffing already inside to hide that skinny frame of yours." She sighs at Danine attempting to hide the riffle, almost as tall as she was, under her clothes. Danine complies with a short nod and hides the gun into cart.

"And help me push that asshole into this cart." Nidnene orders seizing the scant few moments they had before another guard would look at their way. She barely managed to fit the guard's smaller sidearm under her own clothes. Danine would need to settle for the guard's knife.

They waited a few tense minutes and when no one yelled or came to investigate, she became bold enough to try and push their luck further. She quickly shoveled more dirt into the cart to hide the body and whispered to Danine.

"Hit me in the foot with that shovel Danine."

"What? No! Are you completely nuts?" Danine protests in aghast.

"Just do it, Danine" Nidnene commands more forcibly and after a bit of hesitation Danine hits Nidnene on the foot hard enough to make a painful bruise and slow bleeding abrasion but luckily, it's not hard enough to really break anything. Nidnene stifles a loud yelp, massaging her bruised feet to get the pain ebb and the small gash to look more serious which now had trickles of blood matting the fur around it.

"You're already sick... now I'm injured -a cart rolled on my foot if anyone asks, and we'll both be taken to infirmary for check up. Once we get there..." She explains quietly, making a sawing motion with her finger under her throat when she hobbles towards the ladders leading up from the pit and Danine nods in understanding, slowly following her lead.

* * *

Like everything at the camp, the medical procedures had been designed first and foremost with only cost efficiency in mind. Both her and Danine had quickly been whisked away by the guards and escorted to a wire mesh fence enclosed section of the camp, housing the infirmary barracks. After the guards had reported the two slaves in they'd been dumped to wait in line at the yard with the other sick and injured slaves. Again, males and females segregated. If you fainted while waiting... No point wasting the medics time. Nidnene noted with a tired sigh how more than one slave at the sun baked or alternatively; mud caked yard, depending on the day’s weather, had resorted to keeping in clumps of two or three or standing over a sharp pebble or sticking a splinter under fingernails to keep awake and alert like.

After what seemed like an eternity, Nidnene and Danine were ushered in. Nidnene, despite having been at the infirmary before, had no true recollection of it but Danine did have and despite saying nothing her wide fearful eyes were everything Nidnene needed to know about the dubious 'medical practices' the Badoon probably did here. She'd somehow expected the place to be dim, shabby and cramped instead of this rather spacious and well-lit interior with all the white and shiny easy clean-surfaces reeking of disinfectant but she wasn't born yesterday and knew perfectly well that all that shone wasn't gold. In fact, all the cleanliness spoke to her of order and efficiency and it wasn't the pleasant kind of discipline she thought about.

Soon a pair of guards ushered her in to examining room with three people waiting, separating her from Danine. Two of them were Badoon in professional medic outfits. Nidnede knew nor cared about the genders of the two lizards. The third was a Procyonian male Kapo.

She recognized his presence as a normal thing. It was a standard practice to have a Kapo present to translate because at least nine hundred and ninety-nine out of ten hundred Procyonids had been proven to be incapable of being fitted with a standard Badoon version of translation implant. To those who could be implanted was the chance to be made a Kapo offered -few resisted the offer, Nidnene had learned. Which meant that she was going to have to tolerate the presence of this disgusting turncoat for the time being.

The 'nurses’ bark something to the Kapo and leave the room for a short moment, shutting the ominously soundproofed door behind them. The Kapo looks at her expectantly yet passively.

"Well, hop on the examination table and take your clothes off -all of them." He issues at her and Nidnede does as told. With one small exception, she doesn't take of her clothes once she's standing at the table. Instead she reveals the gun she'd been hiding and the Kapo gasps loudly, taking some steps back until his back hits the wall and at that moment the nurses return slamming the door shut. The foremost of them drops the tray holding the medical supplies after seeing the gun at Nidnene's paws and leaps to grab the gun while the other one turns to run and alert the guards. Nidnene instinctively jerks back a step, pulling the trigger in surprise...

* * *

Rocket stops the patrol ship under a heavy tree canopy, next to a narrow but rapidly moving river, to hide it from any orbiting enemy satellites.

"Alright, this should be far enough for us to take a break." He tells Trey whose sitting behind Rocket at one of the passenger seats arranged in double rows to face their each other on both sides of the fuselage.

Rocket glances behind his shoulder when there's no reply and smiles fatherly at his first born, whose fallen asleep in his suit, and walks up to his son. Shaking him gently to wake him up.

"C'mon kit. Let's get you cleaned up. He announces scooping his son up to his arms when Trey slowly stirs and they head out of the bullet shaped patrol dropship.

*

"No, no. We need to keep the suits on while I scrub them clean, don't want your skin to touch the nasty on the outside of our suits." Rocket instructs while dunking his son repeatedly into the river by holding him from the arm pits when confused Trey asks why he's being bathed in his suit.

Rocket allows Trey to remove his helmet and gloved sleeves once his reasonably certain that no traces from his homemade chemical weapons are no longer present in Trey's suit and lifts the kit up to sit at the steep bank. You could never be too sure with that stuff. Rocket thought frowning at the yellowish brown chemical trails from their suits quickly disappearing downstream with a few dead fish carried by the current. After a bit of deliberation, he removes his own helmet as well and leaves it to the bank with Trey. He stretches, craning his neck, feeling the relief of no longer having its weight pressing his neck and shoulders despite having been highly accustomed to its weight. They'd need to dump the Patrol cruiser though, it was also contaminated with traces from the chemicals. Rocket mused sliding down fully into the river to wash in turn. A nice river, Nidnene would have really liked it, especially because it had those picturesque, short rapids some 200 yards away. It was a feature she'd always liked about in streams.

"What's that daddy?" Trey suddenly pipes up bringing Rocket's thoughts back to present.

"What is, where?" Rocket asks looking at the direction Trey was pointing at.

"Looks like an old school water reservoir tower." He confirms to his son and scans the metal structure with his eyes. It would have been barely visible without it's top gleaming in the sun just above the treetops in the distance.

"There's probably a town nearby." He adds, climbing all the way back up the bank to stand next to his son to get a better view of the tower. Town and people meant either safety or trouble but most of all supplies which they were sorely lacking as it were.

"Think, there's food in there, daddy?" Trey sighs longingly.

"Yep, and I'm going to reserve a whole restaurant just for the two of us once we get there." Rocket promises putting his helmet back on. Trey sighs, ears drooping at seeing it. He really didn't like to wear his suit all that much anymore. It smelt stuffy and the helmet's weight made his shoulders ache from just thinking about it.

"C'mon kit, let's put your suit on -just in case." Rocket couches his reluctant son to reattach his suit parts and lifts him up to his shoulders for carry. Rocket wasn't really worried about Trey needing protection from the environment but he'd be damned if he'd let his son get hit by stray ammunition from a possible ambush gunfight and in that situation protection -even as flimsy as that suit, trumped over nothing at all.

The Patrol ship held little value for Rocket anymore even though he locked it from out of habit. The fuel cells were almost depleted, there was nothing worth salvaging for later as parts, he'd stripped the tracking transponders off three quarters of hours and five hundred clicks ago and the interior was contaminated with poisonous chemicals on top of it. Better to abandon that hunk of junk to rust than lug it around for the few more miles of sustained flight it's cells could give and risk being seen from a Badoon satellite.

* * *

Nidnene marveled the weapon that was still smoking a little from the barrel after being discharged. The weight and ergonomics felt uncomfortable to her tiny paws. Still she was glad it was also so 'basic' that probably even the stupidest of 'Coolies' would've known how to use it right. She had a suspicion that this was the exacting intention behind it's outwardly hyper-simplistic design. No recoil, little noise and apparently some sort of autonomous targeting to balance jerking when wielded by an inexperienced user.

She gave a little smirk at the pale green robed Badoon "nurses" now dead on the floor a few feet away from her and hopped down from the examining station's table. The only shred of sympathy she had left was for the hapless Kapo cowering at the corner, probably waiting for his turn to be shot. A possibility which wasn't much of a stretch to imagine considering the hair-trigger in-built to the weapon and the black clawed right index of agitated Nidnene hugging the said trigger.

"Now, you with me or against me?" She asks coldly from the male Raccoonoid, training her weapon at his direction.

"I- I'm with you. Please don't shoot me." The Kapo nods eagerly, clearly not wanting to get shot. Though she was obviously rattled by the sudden change of fortunes, Nidnene suppressed her suspicion about his sincerity, opting to trust the Kapo's will to be free to outdo his fear and self-preservation instincts when it came to Badoon.

"Good, here's how you can prove it; Tell those two lizards outside to come in and don't fuck it if you want to keep breathing after the next two minutes." She reminds him while dragging the dead to be out of sight behind a privacy screen, absently wondering why they had the thing at all -Badoon had no real concept of privacy when it came to slaves.

Nidnene knew her threats to be mostly empty -she was hard pressed enough as it was to shoot even an unarmed Badoon, but the Kapo wouldn’t know this and gulped nervously before nodding.  She briefly wondered if she'd made a lapse in judgment with this Kapo -a mistake here could mean death -hers and Danine's. No turning back now. She gently but nervously hugged the trigger of the over-sized weapon. Caressing its grips reassuringly at her palms, feeling the pull, and set to wait for the Kapo to leave and lead the guards in and took a small solace in her belief that Rocket & kits would have been proud of her right now.

The Kapo, however doesn't move, studying Nidnene instead.

"They're not here. You'll never find them. I'm sorry. I'll still help you look, little use as it may be." The Kapo says turning his back to Nidnene while grabbing the door handle. Nidnene blinks momentarily and takes a jump forward, blocking the Kapo from opening the door.

"What do you mean by 'they're not here'?" She questions sternly.

"Kits they held here. The Mast- Ehm, lizards. They-" The Kapo says licking his lips a bit nervously there.

"They started shipping the underaged away along with the 'housebroken'. Started taking them into another location almost a week ago but I know nothing, I'm just a slave like you, I know only what I see and hear here."

"Well then, what do you know for sure?" Nidnene asks recalling the sporadic but persistent camp rumors about people being shipped out.

"That's all, apart from a bit I overheard from the guards that apparently they'd start with the most promising ones. Whatever that might mean. Herded them to spaceships even, taken off world or so I heard but I doubt it. We're not that good as slave material... Really, why even bother?"

"What do you mean not that good?" Nidnene asks frowning at the words he'd used.

"I mean, just look at us and then compare us to them...We're small, not that strong. Hell, most of us aren't even capable of being fitted with their weird implants and shit." The Kapo counters. Nidnene sees what it is though, the man is scared witless of what they'll do to him and Nidnene if they're caught here and the longer he keeps her talking, the less culpable he can make himself to look if things turn ugly.

"Just send those two guards in here." She finally replies, just wanting to get this crap done. One way or the other.

* * *

 

####  _Stone river_

The name of the town -Stone river, doesn't mean much to Rocket when his son (slowly & awkwardly) reads the roadside sign out loud, written in Procyon-6's squiggly native alphabet. The town beyond the sign seem sleepy -no, abandoned, dead even. It's a small but densely built town of two to three storied brown stucco buildings nestled between rocky hills and the river continues its run through the centre, narrowing into a steep ravine upon reaching the city proper. A single beautifully arching stone bridge spans across it. In short, the town looks like it could have been snatched from a travel agency pamphlet advertising rustic urban holidays at central Italy. The water tower he'd spotted earlier, it's style clashing with the older urban architecture despite being situated at the edge of the town, was clearly a recent addition to improve the town water supply.

 

'It's dead -as dead as a Dodo, Star-lord would have said'. Rocket thought walking along the deserted main market street with his son in carry. The streets should have bustled with life at midday like this. Rocket readjusts Trey a little and jiggles his gun to his free arm. Trey yawns looking lazily around him and Rocket feels his son slowly tensing the more his looking around.

"I don't like this place daddy. It's scary." He whines quietly, tightening his grip on his father.

"Hush... I know son. Let's see if there's anything left to eat at the shops." Rocket calms his kit, walking across the square into a small alley next to a foundation level grocery store. After a bit of searching Rocket locates the service entrance and almost stumbles on their first bodies near the small loading area.

"Don't be scared son. They can't harm you." He mutters trailing his gun at the dead in case they start twitching and promptly lowers it, realizing that headless desiccated corpses weren't going to turn into Zoms and shifts his attention on the shelves inside the shop, scanning for anything edible of which there was quite a lot. Even the refrigeration units were still running which was odd to say the least.

"I'm not a baby." Trey huffs, his act of bravery being foiled by his slight shiver. Rocket just pats his son encouragingly in response.

Seeing nobody emerging from hiding or nothing, despite waiting a bit in case they do, he deposits Trey to sit at the end of the grocery conveyer and retrieves a shopping cart before lifting his son to sit on it while they go for 'five finger discount' shopping tour. Rocket then proceeds to fill the cart full of canned preservatives and other such goodies. The fact that there was anything left to take at all and no signs of widespread looting besides theirs only reinforced his suspicion towards this little town.

* * *

Nidnene cursed. This really wasn't their day it seemed. She'd killed the two guards almost as easily as she had the nurses but now faced a different dilemma. Where to go next and where the frakk was Danine?

The kapo -Gerd wasn't much use in the end, reluctantly sneaking behind her as if expecting to die at any moment until she finally snapped at the man's spinelessness.

"Stop it already. That damn sniveling is getting on my nerves." Nidnene growls pushing the man into a cleaning closet for pep talk, closing the door behind her.

"You don't know what it's like." Gerd whines as Nidnene manhandles him by the collar.

"What, being a slave?"

"No, this!" Gerd cries removing his canvas skull cap and pointing at the bare, scarred, irregular lump in his crown just above his left ear.

"Is that the translator implant? My Rocket's is so much smaller..." Nidnene asks apprehensively, seeing the Badoon version up close for the first time (or what was there to been seen at any rate).

"I know nothing of that... Look you've got to understand. I can't be seen with you! They'll kill me remotely and find you even faster if I'm with you." Gerd explains even more worried now.

"Explain. How can they kill you 'remotely?"

Gerd wrings his palms together nervously before replying.

"The Camp Commandants. They have this little box and it has these buttons... They showed it to us, to keep us in line. You see, there was this one guy who was always sort of unruly, so they showed what happens to unruly slaves... The Butcher did something with the box and this poor chap just, -just grabbed his head and started screaming -it went on and on and then it suddenly stopped because he was- ya know, dead with blood trickling out of his ears and muzzle. They also said that escaping and hiding was meaningless -all prisoners are tracked with both the tattoos and this implant and if you leave your designated work area without permission you get zapped unconscious."

"You mean... like a, a combined cattle prod and homing device?" Nidnene feels a shiver run through her spine, realizing how their escape plan had been doomed from the start.

"What, -what if-, what if we'd put something like a-a bucket over your head or tin foil or-" She proposes waving at Gerd with her arms in near panicked frustration.

"I'm not running around with a tin bucket over my head. That's just stup-." Gerd protests freezing in mid sentence when a throaty male voice interrupts them in heavily accented Procyonian.

"Zat ist alzo pointlez. Ze zignal iz omni-direczional capable of penezrazing any material."

Nidnene lifts her gun, turning around in a flash to see who had opened the closet door, and almost drops the gun from her suddenly numbed fingers at the sight of the Butcher himself standing at the door. Gerd whimpers, curling into a ball at the corner.

"Coward" Nidnene scolds without real heat.

Nidnene knows when to fold it and lowers her gun on the ground at the sight of the commandant and his guards. The Butcher nods his approval, holding an ugly little fake smile at his perfect lizard's lips.

"Gott, now ze will-" The Butcher orders but stops with what his about to say when a loud boom shakes the building, then another and another, in quick succession. The butcher blinks his nictitating membranes in quick surprised succession before saying something to his guards in Badoon. One of them grabs Nidnene's gun away before following the Butcher out and locking the door behind them.

"Well, that went better than expected." Nidnene growls much deflated from her earlier spunk.

"You think, -Really?" Gerd asks, slowly straightening from his 'scared ball of fur'-position at the corner now that the guards had left them to wait in the broom closet, now suddenly turned into a detention unit.

"We're both still breathing, aren't we?" Nidnene grunts upturning a bucket to be used as a seat while waiting.

"Yeah, but for how long?" Gerd mumbles hopelessly and Nidnene had to agree there. The walls were made of metal-like stuff into which the metal shelves were firmly attached. The tiny room was otherwise pretty much bare excepting the generic mops, brooms and few cleaning agents and the only vent was the slit under the metal door.

 

They're not sure how long they've waited in the closet. The loud booming noises outside have largely faded when Nidnene and Gerd perk up. Someone was fiddling with the lock. Gerd gives Nidnene a scared look.

"Badoon would use a keycard" Nidnene comments and jumps back with a yelp when the lock is blown off and the door gets kicked in for good dramatic effect. There's a tense second hanging in the air when the heavily armed Raccoonoid who kicked the door in looks around before settling his eyes on Nidnene and Gerd.

"Rocket? I thought you were dead!" Nidnene squeaks in surprise and Rocket blinks in equal surprise.

"Ahh -Hi honey, sorry I'm late." Rocket stammers lowering his gun down just as Nidnene practically jumps on his neck to strangle him with her relieved hug to which Rocket enthusiastically responds.

* * *

Rocket surveyed the townscape from a hotel room balcony with the binoculars he'd liberated from another shop earlier along with more food and other useful gear such as decent new clothes for Trey and himself to wear. He'd chosen this one room in particular because it held an almost perfect view over town. Comfy beds, nice shower and clean sheets were just an afterthought though still a welcome bonus. The signs of hidden tragedy were there if you knew where to look, inconspicuous plasma scorches at the walls, position of remains, state of the buildings... Something had happened here but it wasn't the Zom hordes. Even Trey was picking it up. Sharp kit, Rocked notes to himself when the boy comments.

"Why've the curtains been drawn on so many windows?" The kit asks dreamily, his elbows propped against the window sill, muzzle leaving ring marks from his nose on the glass.

"Not our business son... They've made their choice and did what they wanted to accordingly." Rocket replies grimly, having noticed some 'suspiciously' swaying shadows at one of the opposite house's windows. Some of the panes in the opposite window were broken making the closed curtains undulate eerily in the draft.

 "And we don't need to go there." He grumbles in stern no-argument tone while setting the camping stove kit on the hotel room table. Something about the cadavers and the town bothered him, bothered him greatly but not enough to deter him from having a nice shower, putting on a new clean and less conspicuous outfit and creating a warm meal for him and his son from the food they'd just looted. The first decent meal they'd had in days. As far as Rocket could discern there was no reason for them to not stay and rest here at the safety and comfort of indoors for the night

He pushed his own emptied plate way, feeling tired but content. Trey had barely gotten through half the food on his plate before he was already drooping heavily. Rocket suppressed a wide yawn of his own, trying to clear his head a little so he could have the energy to get up from the chair and carry his son to bed. He stood up with a tired grunt and suddenly his legs gave out. He narrowly stopped himself from knocking the table over in his attempts to stay upright. Trey had already passed out, snoring gently, cheek resting against the table top without a care as if his father hadn't just nearly face-planted on the floor almost taking the said table with him. Rocket stood there dazed for a moment, vertigo making the room spin. Keeping himself steady with both hands spread in wide A-arch against the table was an effort in itself.

A familiar heat was radiating throughout his lower body. His chemical warfare mods were coming online. They'd been poisoned!

"The flark was in those Krutackin' preservatives?" He grunts weakly, feeling his eyelids getting heavier by the second despite his cybernetics fighting back like a champ to counter it. His knees wobbled and he had to fight to keep his bladder under control. 'Please, don't let me shit my pants, don't let me shit my pants'. He cringed in his mind while his body felt like being made of jello. He pushed himself off the table and wobbled a few steps forward to reach his medical kit at the side table before the floor came rushing towards his face, yet he never even felt himself connect.

* * *

 

Vren Underhill said nothing, watching the near enough hundred men he'd handpicked with Roork Shadewater, toiling at the forest clearing turned to impromptu sports & training track. It was hard for him to concentrate on the task at hand and not even Roork's yelling could keep his focus on the cadets-in-training for long.

"Move it you maggots! Even though my grandma wasn't faster but her excuse was being old!" Roork yelled again holding aloft a stopwatch. This was directed to a knot of three that was lagging behind the main body. They spooked visibly before sprinting to catch the rest at the lap the trainees were doing around the clearing.

Another vision -It was vivid, so bright and 'real' that it genuinely terrified him with its clarity. He stumbled slightly, trying to clear it -to banish the sight. He barely registered how everyone at the track, including Roork stopped to stare at his golden eyes glowing under the deep cowl of his hood.

"Right, okay that's enough. Go fresh up group! Weapon training at seven as scheduled." Roork calls out, dismissing the trainees before turning his full attention to Vren. The cadets shuffle away muttering quietly amongst themselves and Roork knew there would be rumors at the camp tonight.

"You Alright Vren. Was it another vision?" He asks, quietly helping his friend to lay down.

"Alftand-." Vren whispers still dazed.

"Yeah, I know the place. What about it?"

"It's going to be ...gone."

"Shit man... you want to talk about it?" Roork asks carefully. Vren had had these 'episodes' more and more frequently and the only thing Roork had been able to do for help was to offer a sympathetic ear and it galled him that it was all he realistically could do.

"They're getting stronger Roork, more vivid too and I can't figure out the reason why... other than that the more vivid a vision the more probable it is to happen." Vren hitches trying to collect his thoughts.

"It used to be just sensations but I saw this, saw it like with my own true eyes. The last stand at the bridge over Alft. Last hours of Alftand... It is about to be overrun by a massive horde of Zoms. The male citizens will make their last stand at the bridge to buy more time for their families. The women and old would have been there with them if the presence of children and sick hadn't forced them to reconsider... They're buying them time, buying it with their lives, for weak and children to get out. Only It won't be enough."

Roork just nods solemnly before asking. "Is there anything else?"

"Yes, when you take the cadets to Alftand... and then to Stone river -this must happen for us to have a chance, and once you're there; Kill them, kill them all. The ones holding the water tower. They've betrayed their kin." Vren orders coldly, looking Roork in the eyes and Roork has the strangest of sensations of wanting to argue against the harsh orders but feels as if his tongue has rooted itself into his mouth and finds his will simply melting under that golden blaze.

"I will." seems prudent enough as a reply. He rises, dusts his clothes from dry leaves and debris before hurrying to relay the orders without another word.

Vren closed his eyes uttering a tired sigh. He hadn't told everything to Roork about what was new. The aliens were in his visions now -other aliens even more strange than the Badoon. He hopes they're -if not friendly, then at least indifferent in this conflict. That they'd be here to fight off the Badoon like the Guardian ranger said and would then leave.

He groans softly and stands up, knowing what he'd need to do next. Talk to the so called supreme command, residing at their base camp, about the visions he'd had. Sure, he had been given the power to make them do what he wanted to but that was just tyranny and he preferred reasoning over force in any case. Now if only those people would actually listen to reason the way Roork always did... A stray thought for possible alternative solutions made him shiver.

He left the command tent an hour later. They had politely listened what he had to say -they always did, but once he was gone they'd do what they felt like regardless. He could only ask the Great maker to let them see reason and prepare for the assault to free the camps as simultaneously as possible, starting from the one that was in Rokuten. It wasn’t the largest of the myriad slave camps that had sprung up following the invasion but it had been the first and many high ranking Badoon still held it as their base.

* * *

The guardians M-ship, the Milano, is quietly making its progress to leave Nova corps flaghip's hangar with several other vessels coming and going. It also seemed like the Nova corps had already snatched a few Badoon slave transport ships and were regrouping to snatch some more emerging through the ominous looking jump gate which Rocket had described in his message. Peter eyes the telemetry data for the unusual jump gate calculatingly and then assesses friendly traffic outside near the carrier group before switching the autopilot on to be free to address the team.

"Okay, Guardians, don't forget, this might get dangerous soon. So, let's put on our mean faces. " Star-lord reminds his team turning in his pilot's chair to face them.

"Trust me Quill. This won't be our first space battle." Gamora sighs relaxed.

"No, Drax it's just an expression you don't have to look meaner than you already are." She says to Drax who only shrugs.

"I was just practicing." but he stops making 'mean faces' just the same.

"Anyway, we're engaging for jump in five." Peter announces, turning his chair around to glance at the screens after hearing a soft ping-sound from the console.

 

In T-minus three hours they would have crossed the dark matter gate and vanguard the assault on Procyon-6.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry for the long delay with updating you wonderful people reading and commenting this fic.
> 
> Life's been hectic for me and moving to anew city hasn't made it any less so-
> 
> I'm hoping that this new chapter feels like it's worth the long wait.


	14. Chapter 14

 

## Ch14

## Moments of clarity

His laying on his back in the dark. Trey has possessively latched himself on top of his belly sleeping, though Rocket knows from his son’s damp shirt that it’s from crying himself to exhaustion. His head throbs but not because of the drugs in the food, because of being rather harshly manhandled while being incapacitated, which in Rocket’s case was by being dragged around and down the stairs and out to the street by the heels at which point the drugs were in full effect and even his cybernetic augments could no longer keep him awake.

Rocket slowly gathers up to his elbows to look around, careful to not wake up Trey.

The room was quiet and without light but like all raccoonoids, he would have an excellent nose and night vision even without the enhancements and could make out shapes and dimensions about the space they were in just from the slivers of light seeping in through the door jambs situated at the end of the staircase. They were not alone in this place. He could easily smell and hear at least a dozen other bodies with them not to mention touch them. There were two or three bodies just at the arm’s length in either side of him.

“Hands to yourself pall.” came the quiet but manly mumble when Rocket quietly reached out to feel the person next to him with his paws.

“sorry, just wanted know whose laying next to me.” Rocket replies retracting his paws.

“iss -what they all say. Go back to sleep new guy, yer kit was noisy enough to wake the dead. We ain’t getting fed before morning anyway and if you need to piss, the bucket is at the corner by the stairs- spill it an’ we’ll make you lick it from the floor.” the guy grumbles before settling back to sleep.

Rocket sighs, wriggling a bit to get into more comfy position to lay at the hard cement floor.

 

” You, get up!”

Rocket is awakened by a harsh kick at the side. Three rough looking raccoonoids with Badoon-made weapons have circled them and the one talking, -a big brute with a perpetual scowl, had just kicked him to the side while a second one is keeping Trey from crying or ~~running~~ crawling away by holding his muzzle shut with one hand while the other hand is keeping the kit painfully in place by the loose skin at his neck. the third one has trained his weapon at the other prisoners.

“Wha- what’s going on?” Rocket mutters trying to get his bearings before everything comes flooding back to him. The door up by the stairs is open, flooding the dark space with daylight, intensely bright enough after hours of darkness to make even his cybernetic ocular filters react annoyingly every time the door swings in the draft. Even when half-blinded and still half-asleep Rocket had already calculated that the three guards were likely to waste him and Trey if he’d try anything foolish, all the same his already rolling contingencies and scenarios through his mind about how to turn the tables .

“Get moving and bring the brat too. The boss wants to see them both.” the kicker remarks without replying to Rocket while cuffing his but not his son’s wrists to front with simple mechanical cuffs. That he could use to his advantage…

Harsh daylight at the water tower’s narrow stair balcony, blessedly causes Rockets eye implants to adjust and stop from blinking erratically between enhanced night-vision and full flare protection-mode, not that he has much time to feel relief or enjoy the scenery. the ‘goon squad’-leader pushes Trey for Rocket to carry when they’re escorted at gun point down by the stairs that wind around the sides of the water tower and onward ending to an alley separating the metal walled maintenance shack from the tower base.

“Son, I know you’re scared but I need you to do something when they’re distracted with me -” Rocket whispers to Trey as quietly as he can. Trey nods trembling slightly in his lap. “-good boy, now listen up” … His father gives a quick glance over his son towards his captors, unaware of his conspirations, before continuing to explain his plan.

Inside, the shack is lit more by daylight filtering in from the ceilings light windows than the few dingy bulbs at the ceiling, causing the dust motes dance in the light. Rocket quickly takes a stock that there was at least a dozen armed raccoonoids present, several bunk beds and a few desks along with the necessary pumps, pipes and things for the reservoir -though now shut off, obviously. The goons push them through one more door at the back into a smallish office space. A mid-aged looking raccoonoid in casual clothing of pale brown pants and white short sleeved dress shirt glances from his work and stands up from behind the desk in exaggerated manner when they’re escorted in. A manner which Rocket has learned to usually associate with petty gangsters and small-time mob bosses. Rocket tries not to show emotion when he notices that the man was examining his and Trey’s possessions, taken from the hotel room.

“Welcome. I am Aarkon Seventh son and you’re him. -the one they call Rocket.” He declares. a light smirk dangling at his cheeks that does nothing to lower the threat his emanating. Rocket says nothing, glaring at Aarkon and helping visibly trembling Trey to sit on a vacant chair in front of the desk.

“And that must be the kit. They want you both, you know. Want you SO badly…” Aarkon croons staring Rocket intensely, coming uncomfortably close to invading his personal space.

“I don’t know what- “, Rocket starts, pulling his head back and sideways but Aarkon clamps his mouth shut sharply with his paws and turns Rocket’s gaze forcibly back to his. The goons raise their guns threateningly when Rocket raises his paws in reaction, forcing him to tolerate Aarkon’s manhandling while Aarkon continues to monologue like nothing happened -still clamping now fuming Rocket’s muzzle with his paw, though he is now moving Rocket’s head slowly from side to side.

“Do not interrupt, I was not finished. The Badoon… They want you, but why? You don’t seem so much to me. Sure, you’re big and well-grown but so is Binny and they don’t want him enough to pay for one’s weight in gold…” Aarkon muses aloud while the brawny thug at the back, designated as Binny, gives a nervous glance at being singled out by his boss.

Suddenly Aarkon nods to his goons and they grab Rocket’s arms holding him tight despite the cuffs. Aarkon then produces a lighter from his pocket, bringing it uncomfortably close to Rocket’s left eye and painfully holds the eyelid open with a finger, looking for something in Rocket’s eyes who’s quickly starting to feel alarmed under Aarkon’s intense scrutiny. And he can feel his traitorous retinal implants reacting to being exposed to sudden increase of light.

“yes, yes I see now why they want him. Alive yes, but they said nothing of the condition when they’re brought in. Fetch the Doc, these two are going to bring us a great harvest.” Aarkon nods to his goons, satisfied with what he saw, releasing his hold on Rocket while his goons grab Rocket’s arms tighter, holding him tight despite his struggle. Aarkon merely quirks a smile at him but it’s enough for Rocket to feel a shiver of dread running down his half-artificial spine. Trey begins to sniffle, trying to hold back a tear.

 

#### Last stand at Alftand

 

Roork wrung his palms together in washing pattern ears flattened against his skull while studying the map of Alftand -or what remained. He was sitting at the back of one of the several trucks their regiment were riding on. Alftand had once been an important town now not so much -but even when mostly ruined it held the last major bridge over the stretch of the beginning of the eight hundred miles that was the widely meandering course of the end run for the great river Alft.

The Zoms couldn’t swim too well… especially not here where the river was widening from running fast in deep but narrow gorges to a shallow but lazy river, almost two-mile-wide, before it would reach the southern Tharmol sea. If only they’d still had an Air force left it would have been an easy task to scout the area and destroy this last bridge between the continental heartlands and the already doomed Olzaba region.

He folded the paper map -one that he assumed ‘the boss’ would have affectionately called as ‘cute but old fashioned’ if he’d seen it. He stowed it back to his pack before looking at the cadets with him. He’d picked these younglings himself with Vren, stoic and hard-eyed to the last in their brown, hooded monk’s robes.

The convoy lurches to a halt just as Roork is informed through his link via battalion channel that they’ve arrived and Roork can’t help but silently marvel at that piece of technology; the receiver was snugly wrapping the base of the outer lobe of his left ear while the transmitter piece nestled below the chin against his neck just above the larynx. Another one of the many things they’d gained from the Galactic Guardian-Ranger Rocket to fight the lizard people invading their home planet. With a bit of practicing they could take and send messages almost without a word being spoken aloud. He stretches to grab his flechette riffle from the rack, refocusing on what he must do and rolls his shoulders a bit before standing up. He still wasn’t quite used on the weight of the body armor they’d been provided with -the new design was unmistakably Guardian ranger’s doing, Roork was sure of it.

“Alright then kits, move out! Defensive perimeter fifty meters out!” He calls fastening the chin strap of his helmet before jumping out after the cadets.

 

“The charges are set Commander.” A cadet informs Roork who affirms and turns back to watch the citizens being loaded into trucks. He glances up in thought, if the sky would remain heavily overcast they wouldn’t need to worry about the Badoon making an air strike from orbit against the convoy. The air had a humid quality to his nose and sure enough the pitter-patter of raindrops announced the coming rain while another kind of pitter-patter at his earpiece told him that the first waves of Zoms had been spotted.

“Battle stations! the Zoms are advancing from the south-west and heading up by the west bank.” He announces through the commlink and cocks his riffle as a Go! -sign for the first convoy to ready to leave with the civilians.

The lead truck revs its engine a bit- Roork turns his attention back to his commanding of men when a sudden blood curling jabber is heard from a distance. He turns around towards the sound asking through the comm-link what’s going on.

“Oh Fo- fuu—ck sh-akes!” Roork spits after a short dispatch through the commlink, realizing how his previous plan has been laid to shambles in but a few moments.

The Zoms were already at both sides of the river and closing in the trap. Roork gives yet another curse before ordering his men at the west bank to retreat back across the bridge and then to blow it up as planned. Not much else he could do, but this way they would only fight the flanking force.

“Call those trucks back and place them in semi-circle against the river bank. Then take positions inside it.” He orders with a bad feeling at his gut. It was better to have the trucks with them than having them cross a terrain with only minimal escort and an unknown number of Zoms running loose. The ruined town would offer no shelter either.

Roork takes a deep breath and hefts his gun while most of the Cadets take positions at the outer rim of the truck circle and ignite their signature Photon blades forsaking the flechette guns at their loins and rifles slung at the backs. he looks at his weapon and then counts the number of properly armed men before deciding.

“Give your guns to the civilians if you’re going use a photon blade, we’re going to need all the firepower we’ve got.” The Cadets look at him for confirmation before nodding and each giving their gun to an able looking civilian. Civilians in turn nod or thank quietly realizing the situation. He then instructs their hastily marshaled ‘auxiliares’ to take positions on top of the trucks with his cadets staying on the ground and to only shoot if they think they can hit a Zom in the head for sure. Kits and infirm they've stuffed inside the cabins.

The only sound is the patter of fat rain drops hitting the ground and the low hiss against ignited Photon blades. The civilians clutch whatever weapons they’ve managed to scavenge, sensing the mood. Roork squeezes the weapon handle nervously, anytime now, and nods to himself when the first ragged shadows begin to move at the forest edge. An ear-splitting cry echoes from the treeline and another one returns it from the west.

“Blow the bridge when the first hundred are on it.” Roork orders calmly into his ear piece. a strange but not uncomfortable feeling of peace engulfs him when a loud boom signals the bridge being destroyed. He was being how he was meant to be and supposed to be.

As the great gibbering horde advances from the treeline, Roork felt like he wanted to strangle the idiot that wrote the scout reports; there were at least thrice as many Zoms than what had been estimated. Though they now had twice as many men in arms than what they had had at the beginning, he wasn’t sure if it would make a difference at all.

“Think they’re going to sing about us later?” One of his Cadets whispers nervously, probably intending it more for himself than anything.

“Sure they will kid.” Roork whispers back and pats the Cadet reassuringly between the shoulders – ‘assuming there’s anyone left to sing the songs…’ but the last part is voiced only in his mind.

* * *

 

After carrying Trey and escorting Rocket in to a green garden shack-like building near the main housing unit, the thugs splay Rocket on his back, arms and legs spread eagle, on the metal operation table and tie him securely to wait on it while throwing fussy Trey into a ‘tiger cage’, - Rocket tugged the thick leather restraints experimentally -they wouldn’t budge. The still present faint smell of old petrol and grease hanging in the air despite all the refurnishing and heavy scent of bleach and old blood on top, told him that it indeed must have been a garden shed once. He could feel his pulse quickening. It took a lot of his willpower just to avoid snapping right there. He took several more calming breaths and slowly raised his head to look at his son inside the cage who grins proudly, holding a set of keys palmed from one of the guards. Rocket felt like he could’ve fainted from relief watching Trey fiddle with the keys one by one to find the right one.

“They don’t fit daddy!” Trey whines in distress when even the last key in the ring fails to fit.

“Okay son, look if there’s a -a nail or stout piece of wire or- something else sharp and thin you can use to pick the lock.” Rocket tries amid his rising panic. They really didn’t have much time to waste before he was going to start losing organs. Trey scrambles looking frantically around the cage.

They both freeze at the sound of latch being rattled.

 

Trey wasn’t sure what that ‘Doctor’ was doing to daddy but after he had used scissors to cut off daddy’s clothes and put a drip pouch on his arm, it must have hurt an awful lot judging from the way daddy had been shaking and hissing sharply between arduous inhales. Shaking and hissing but not screaming or even cursing, not even once… His daddy was really brave even when stripped naked and bound tight to the table the way he was.

The ‘doctor’ curses loudly before pulling the long big needle out from daddy’s hip. Daddy gives a lopsided grin in return.

“Smile all you want, freak. I always get want in the end.” the ‘Doctor’ grumbles in return.

Daddy just keeps smirking knowingly and the ‘Doctor’ grits his teeth in thinly veiled frustration and throws the needle way over his shoulder without looking or caring where it lands but Trey does…

“I’ll be back,” He declares vindictively before leaving the room and slamming the door shut behind him.

 

“Bastard, wants a sample of my bone marrow… the jokes on you fucker, I’ve got fuso-carbon and metal infused bones, some shitty extraction needle isn’t going pierce them.” His daddy whispers, earlier smile slipping into pained grimace at his face before softening again when he looks at Trey wearily. He gives a toothy grin when the latter raises a questioning eyebrow at the slowly dripping wound at his father’s pelvis and the ghastly blood caked needle, now resting at his paws.

“Good kit… Now let’s get to work. He’ll be back soon… With a drill bit, I wager.” Rocket advises but Trey doesn’t find his daddy’s muddled encouragements nearly as reassuring as the former probably hopes it to be, focusing into picking the lock the way daddy has taught and he has seen him doing it.

* * *

They were winning, that much was obvious to anyone, so that can’t be the reason why Peter seems so anxious. Gamora surmised while glancing at her team mate’s face. The current battle had dwindled to a short lull as both sides were regrouping to count their losses before taking another pass at their each other’s. The Milano had taken some damage but nothing Rocket wouldn’t be able to fix once they’d reunited. Speaking of which…

“You seem troubled Peter.” She opens. Quill glances at her direction, stopping the nervous opening and closing of his fists that he’d been caught doing.

“I’m just – we’ll not really worried just a little anxious to see Rocket again. His personal comms are down AND you know how anal that furball gets if any one of us ever fails to answer ours when he calls us… it could be nothing or it could be really bad.”

“His ship’s beacon still works. So, he probably made it safely back to the planet” She says not letting nary of her own worry show.

“We both know that means jack shit… Milano’s beacon was working fine too after the battle of Xandar, despite the ship being completely trashed, remember?” Peter denies, rising from the captain’s chair to stretch his back in languid manner.

“Aww, just fuck it with this stalling. This fight will go fine even without us. Let’s get down there, grab Rocket, kill a few Badoon up close and personal and find a decent dive bar after.”

That sentiment is something she can get behind even if it went against what had been agreed with Denarian Dey.

“Dey won’t like it if we break the Nova core first contact rules.” She replies already locking the signal from Rocket’s ship beacon to the nav station readout she’d been handling at the co-pilot seat -something which would’ve normally been Rocket’s job not hers.

“-And when was the last time we followed their rules to the letter? Besides, Rocket has probably broken at least fifty of those rules already by just being down there in the first place.” Quill scoffs, his mind made up.

“Good. I’ll message Dey that we’re going to scout the situation on the planet.” Gamora agrees without a hitch as Quill harnesses back to his seat and grabs the flight sticks.

 

“He was here. Landed maybe two-three days ago and I think those three corpses tried to apprehend him and who ever it was that was with him at the cockpit, as seen in the message.” Gamora informed Peter who was going through the burned wreck that had been Rocket’s ship.

“Nah- definitively crashed, I think the Badoon shot him down, there’s starship-grade blaster gashes on the wings and mid-section.” Peter says shaking his head a little.

“There are two sets of tracks here, faint though they are, one for the Badoon and ones for Rocket and his company. I believe Rocket’s companion is wounded and he had to carry him. His tracks get deeper while the marks of a tiny person pulling himself forward with his hands end.” Drax indicates the tracks with a tip of one of his knives. It had taken some time for the other Guardians to realize that Drax was in fact a very good hunter & tracker who took much joy from the rare occasions that allowed the showcasing of his skills.

“Great job, man. Can you follow them further?” Peter congratulates clapping Drax on the back in passing.

“Of course I can. He has not attempted to hide them which is why six or seven Badoon have also found them and followed him some time later, likely the rest in their own craft with trackers following him on foot.” Drax informs conversationally.

“I am Groot?” Groot asks with slight worry.

“Yeah, you and Gamora go with Drax, I’ll stay behind with the Milano, pull in what’s left of Rocket’s wreck and pick you up at the end of the trail.” Star-lord commands and the trio sets on the trail while Peter begins to fuss with towing the wreck into Milano’s loading bay.

 

Star-lord lands the Milano on the front yard of the building the other Guardians had called-in as the place where Rocket’s trail ends. He immediately notices how the architecture of the building is strangely familiar yet also very odd.

“What is it with these weird dimensions. I feel like a frickin’ giant? He grumbles after almost hitting his head on the light fixtures hanging from the roof by just crouching through the annoyingly low doorway and rising back to his full height when inside. the inside was a mess of broken glass and furniture. "Weird, it's all kid-sized too." he remarks to himself looking around the room.

“In here.” Gamora winks him to walk further in and through the house.

“Kilroy was here…” Peter snorts not entirely surprised at the sight of the dead Badoon battalion haphazardly piled outside by the backdoor.

“I still don’t know who this Kilroy is, but Rocket was here for sure and I think he gassed these poor bastards before shooting them for good measure.” Gamora smiles with the self-assured smirk of someone who is overly aware of their groups collected talents.

“The tracks end here in any case. He took a shuttle from the Badoon-.” She says sheathing her sword she’d been fondling by the crook of her arm.

“-And, there’s no way knowing which way he left with it. Literally gone with the wind.” Quill finishes her sentence with a disgruntled nod. They really needed to find Rocket, he would be the only one with the knowledge to properly discern the situation the planet was in but as much as Peter felt frustrated he also understood that there really was nothing else they could do for the time being.

“Okay gang, lets report back to Dey what we’ve found so far.” Quill suggests when they’re all gathered back together to stand outside the Milano to decide what to do next.

“Not much to report. We haven’t seen even a single person belonging to local populace so far and there’s no signs of Rocket” She sums up and glares at Drax who’s about to open his mouth, “Shut up Drax I know we have the tracks and that alone isn’t good enough.”

“Well it’s not like we can do much here either.” Peter reminds them.

“We should help the locals.” Drax proposes and Peter is pretty sure it’s mostly because Drax is just wanting to pent some of his energy in fighting and not for being altruistic.

“I am Groot?” Groot asks to which Peter nods agreeing. “Yeah, you’re right. We don’t know if or how far they’ve fortified the planet yet, but I don’t think they have completed it or Rocked would have told so in his message…”

“True the Badoon would’ve already blackmailed us into leaving by threatening to blow the planet if they could.” Gamora agrees with Groot & Peter.

“Tell you what guys. We tell Dey what we’ve found so far and use orbital scans to locate the drill sites, so the Nova can bombard then from orbit. Since we’re already here we can use our ship to survey the effects for Nova from the ground while waiting to hear from Rocket.

“Sounds good enough.” Gamora accepts without further comment. Groot, as usual, easily agrees to what’s been discussed leaving only Drax to grumble about how he hasn’t agreed on merely sitting around yet has no reason to continue advocating for his point.

* * *

 

The padlock clicks open and drops on the floor with a low ‘thunk’ and Rocket feels like he could do the same from sheer relief. Trey throws the icky needle way and drags himself to Rocket’s side. As soon as Rocket has his left paw free he grabs for the intravenous needle that was placed on his right arm cephalic vein.

“Now son, I’m flarking mad and when I’m mad…” Rocket hisses dangerously from between clenched teeth, rising shakily to sitting position at the table. ignoring the slow bleeds in his arm and hip.

“Daddy, you’re bleeding.” Trey whispers when Rocket scoops him up from the floor to sit at his lap.

“Don’t worry, son. It’s nothing I can’t fix.” He reassures while rummaging around the room for something to be used as a weapon when the “doc” eventually returns.

Unfortunately, the room inside the shack is rather bare except surgical equipment but despite scalpels, bone saws and other medical tools laying abound none of the bladed instruments were worth it as melee weapon against an armed opponent and he didn’t have the time to start figuring out which of the chemicals were volatile enough to be used as explosives except, -except the extension cord. Extension cord, brass door handle and the 400v power outlet to be more precise… yes, those he could use for a bit of ‘fun’ when the Doc returns.

 

“Stop gawking Trey and hand me the string.” Rocket hissed at Trey for the third time who can’t seem to stop staring at the slightly charred remains of the man whose name they never learned and assuredly don’t even care to learn. Only ever knowing the sadistic man by the moniker ‘Doc’. Trey blinks handing the surgical stitching string for his father to sew close the deep but cleanly cut surgical wound at his hip, but he keeps giving sidelong glances at the corpse who he feels is staring at him. Those opaque eyes remind Trey of baked fish mommy used to make in the oven at the weekend. Eyes used to be his and his brothers favorite part of the dish but his not sure if he can stomach eating fisheyes ever again.

“Alright son, you stay here, I’ll be back in a bit.” Rocket says testing the weird looking ‘bow’ he has created from metal bits, surgical tubes and other odds and ends at the room, fashioned into a cable-backed bow design. Trey looks at his father pleadingly.

“Do I have to? his staring at me daddy. I don’t want to stay with him.”

“Who is...? For crying out loud, fine, just stay quiet then.” His father relents with barely hidden exasperation in his voice and scoops Trey to sit between his shoulders, Casted legs divided on both sides of the neck. Even when sitting like this Trey is barely big enough to be seen from above his father’s head.

Rocket peeks out carefully, noting that its already night and the few guards posted outside around the tower premises haven’t noticed anything out of place yet.

He might be naked, wounded and nearly unarmed but these drekk-heads had another thing coming if they thought it was going to stop him...

* * *

 

Roork was tired, so very tired but the damn creatures just kept on coming, His gun had run out of fletchettes over half an hour ago and he’d had to resort to plasma blade -a weapon he’d never felt as his own and it was showing. Though the weapon itself was light as a feather it was also its downside. A blade so light that you wouldn’t even feel it moving yet able to cut through steel without effort meant that you had to constantly concentrate on it or you risked taking a limb -yours or someone else’s. He inhaled sharply, focusing to cut yet another Zom into half -as noted the blade swished through the creatures like nothing, freeing whatever dark science had entrapped the life within.

He spun the blade and almost hit a Cadet at his left flank when he lifted the blade up to guard against the claws of another Zom attacking him with a downward slash. The Zom nor flinched nor slowed despite having its both palms cut off from the wrist -they never did. Roork finished the maneuver with a slight upward rising of the blade tip. With the momentum of its own body combined, it was enough to slash the forward pushing creatures head messily off. Ending its charge then and there.

He had barely enough time to register the moment when something jumped on top of him, biting at his shoulder arm, forcing him to drop his weapon. He crashed forward screaming in pain, twisting desperately to dislodge the creature but the beast bound him down to the ground with inhuman strength, clawing at his armor to get its fangs past the neck plate and Roork knew that the next bite would be it – But the final blow never came. The Zom fell limp on top of him -a black shafted composite arrow having pierced its skull. Roork blinked owlishly at the sudden turn of fortunes but quickly scrambled back to his feet and grabbed his sword and immediately aborted what he was about to do, staring surprised.

The relentless Zoms had been nearly destroyed and his men were warily eying at another group of raccoonoids closing in from the woods.

“Stand down boys, stand down, they’re friendly.” Roork orders before taking of his helmet, panting and sinking down on his knees to lean against a truck tire. He felt queasy, blearily watching the newcomers approach. Relief washed over him, and It felt like he could sleep for a year or more.

“figured it might be you.” He croaks at the sight of a familiar redhead separating from the main group.

“yeah, I know we’re technically not supposed to be here and all… but they really couldn’t let you guys just leave and neither could we really. So, it was an easy decision for us to join forces and me and the lads volunteered as scouts.” Eir the Red explains and pulls his arrow free from the Zom with a sickening crunch.

“Whose they?” Roork asks, feeling strangely dizzy not just tired. Must be the fucking blood loss… or an anaphylactic shock from an infected wound, great.

“The guys from the Last stand at District 16- you know, those guys.” Eir supplies helpfully.

“Oh them, but how’d you get here so fast...?” Roork sighs closing his eyes just for a moment. Already deciding the answer to be rather irrelevant in the larger scheme of things.

“Hey boss, come on stay with me!” A voice yells at him. He looks at the face in front of him, it all looks kind of hazy. Eir? Why is he yelling and how come his laying down all of a sudden? Someone yells from far off about needing a medic. Roork doesn’t care, he really needs to rest and closes his eyes, just for a moment.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Honestly this work should've been finished like forever ago. -You know, life, motivation, life...
> 
> With Infinity war coming out next week... I worry even more if I'll ever manage to finish this.


End file.
